


And Who Could Tell the Dogs From the Men?

by rowenablade



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Porn, But mostly angst, Canon-Typical Misogyny, Canon-Typical Violence, Dark Sansa, F/M, Female Bonding, First Time, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Mix of Show and Book Canon, Pre-The Battle of the Blackwater, Problematic problem-solving, Sansa has Agency, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-04
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-01-23 16:16:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 25,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18553321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rowenablade/pseuds/rowenablade
Summary: A story in which Sansa began to understand the way of the world far sooner than she ever let on.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A SanSan story that came from my love of the dark, manipulative Sansa we've been seeing in the show and my desire to write the most canon-compliant smut I could come up with. 
> 
> This is actually the first fic I ever wrote and I wasn't sure I'd ever post it, but with Season 8 blowing so many holes in my ship this is how I'm coping. Warning: this is not a romance. Sandor and Sansa in this story have deep, complicated issues they are in no way equipped to help each other with. If you love these characters as much as I do but don't necessarily need a happy ending, you might like this fic.
> 
> This is mostly show canon, with book canon sprinkled in completely at my whimsy. Feel free to imagine whatever iteration of the characters you prefer, at whatever age you feel comfortable with.
> 
> The title is taken from the song "Ash" by Murder By Death.

His first instinct had been to join them. That was what had kept Sandor awake for the last three days, swilling wine and sick in the mornings. When the king required his services he managed to scrape himself upright. He mustn’t falter in his duties. He didn’t care if he was talked about, didn’t even particularly care if he lived or died anymore. But if he failed Joffrey, and was beheaded as punishment, his brother would hear of it. And he would laugh. Sandor could and had endured any number of horrors, but he could not bear the thought of causing Gregor even a moment’s amusement. So he kept up appearances. He did as he was told. And he spent every spare moment drinking himself into a stupor, to try to erase the thoughts that had plagued him since the Fleabottom riot.

Sansa had kept to her chambers, emerging only when Joffrey ordered it. The times Sandor glimpsed her she’d been paler than usual, seemed smaller. He called her Little Bird, but these days she reminded him more of a mouse, ears pricked, ready to bolt at the smallest shadow. The color was drained from her face, and even her hair seemed duller, more brown than auburn. It was as if she was trying to disappear into the walls, willing her beauty away. Sandor welcomed it. He didn’t want his eyes drawn to her.

When the riot began and Sandor realized Sansa was nowhere in sight, he feared the worst. In his experience, the worst was what played out, or near to it. But the Imp had ordered her found, and the Hound believed he would try harder to find her than the gold cloaks. Most of them would probably spare a glance over their shoulders before joining in the looting and raping. Sandor would at least bring her body back to the Red Keep, in whatever state he found it.

Torture would never be able to make him admit the minuscule hope in his heart, that he would find her alive. That in the confusion, he would be able to escort her out of the city, to bring her back home. A better chance to escape might never present itself, but he had to find her first, and find her unharmed. 

He didn’t know what instincts led him to her. He’d heard screams, but at that point everyone was screaming. The howls of men whose blood was up, the piteous cries of the women unfortunate enough to find themselves in their path. He’d heard and seen it all before. He didn’t care. Most people deserved to die, and they all did eventually. The details were unimportant. He’d been ordered to find Sansa. He’d do his job. 

He’d passed scene after scene of carnage, looking for red hair, or a pink gown, or pale noblewoman’s skin. He’d hear the sounds coming from the alley and followed them, and suddenly there she was, pinned to the ground by four men. Battle had sharpened Sandor’s intuition into something that worked instantly, without language, and he perceived immediately that the men were armed with short-range weapons, that Sansa was terrified but as yet unharmed, and that her assailants had not noticed him. The conclusion to this scene was foregone; he could kill all of them before they had a chance to turn around. But his reflexes momentarily failed him at the sight of her.

Her hair was in wild disarray, her gown rucked up past her thighs. One of her attackers had hit her in the face, and a shade of purple was already blooming around her left eye. She didn’t look like a highborn girl anymore. She looked like an animal, a panicked, trapped one. She had always been so poised. Even when the king was finding new ways to torment her she never lost that ramrod-straight posture. But now all her highborn breeding had left her, reducing her to nothing but a girl on a floor, a girl possessed of a fine body, the muscles taught with terror, the skin flushed. He saw her like that and all of a sudden his course of action became clear. Kill these other men, then take her here on this dirt floor. Her mind might very well be too far gone to recount the events. She would know that she’d been raped, and that the Hound had brought her back to the castle. Any other details would never leave this room. No one would believe her, and even if they did, no one would care. 

The man on top of her was now fumbling at his breeches, and Sandor moved without a sound. Two quick motions, and he had gutted the would-be-raper. He made short work of the other three. Then he turned to Sansa, and in that moment he meant to finish what the scum had started. 

Her eyes locked with his, a fine circle of white showing all the way around the blue orbs. For a moment she held her breath, then it began to escape her in shallow, hitching sobs. The sound was so pitiful, and so small, that the bloodlust fell in Sandor instantly. Suddenly he just felt old, and broken, and so very tired. Tired of blood and rage and the sound of screams. He could fuck her here on this floor, and it might give him a moment’s pleasure, and then it would just become another one of the horrid things he’d done. Another pointless, pain-filled day as the Hound.

She was crying, and he didn’t want to hear that sound. He hoisted her up over his shoulder, muttering some empty words to try and quiet her, and he carried her back to the castle. It was only when they reached the Red Keep that he remembered his secret plan, to take her away from this hell of a city, to help her. He’d had his chance, and his lust had distracted him, and now another chance would never come. 

Rage and disgust rose up in his chest, so thick he felt he’d choke on it, and he’d dumped her at her captor’s feet. “Someone get the Little Bird back in her cage,” he’d growled, and then he’d left her at the mercy of the lions. He couldn’t save her. He couldn’t save anyone.

————

Sansa spent the days following her attack in a fog. She moved about where she was told, ate when food was put in front of her, responded when asked a question. Mostly she stayed in her chamber. She found herself unable to bear crowds, became short of breath when around more than a few people at a time. Even when more than one of her handmaidens came to tend to her she felt panic growing in her chest and had to ask them to leave. Most of them seemed puzzled by her reaction. Gossip had spread the way it does, and everyone knew that the Hound had carried her back to the castle, bloodied and nearly hysterical with fear but unspoiled. Perhaps they thought she should be grateful at her good fortune. The notion made her sick.

She understood now. She’d come to King’s Landing a stupid girl, but that time of her life was over. The look on the rapers’ faces, and on the Hound’s after he’d killed them but before he’d lifted her off the floor, told her everything she needed to know about the world. There were predators, and there were prey, and the slit between her legs made her irrevocably one of the latter. There was no escape. Even if she somehow made it out of the city, away from Joffrey, she would one day be wed to another animal disguised as a man. As a girl she’d dreamed of a kind and gentle husband, but such men didn’t survive in this world. They lost their heads like her father. Only the monsters survived.

The only handmaiden of hers who seemed to understand her state was Shae. At first Sansa had mistrusted the foreign girl of mysterious origin, certain she was a spy for the Queen, or Littlefinger. She knew her handmaidens were all in the service of one or the other, and kept quiet around them. But Shae so obviously didn’t belong that it was ridiculous to assume ones as canny as Cersei or Lord Baelish would put her in their employ. It was the kind of twisted logic she was becoming fluent in at King’s Landing. Shae seemed the most untrustworthy, therefore she was likely the most trustworthy. 

Moreover, she didn’t expect Sansa to behave normally. She spoke softly around her charge, all but tiptoeing into the room with food or hot water for her bath. When she brushed Sansa’s hair, she did it with such a light touch that Sansa had dozed off once or twice, lulled by the sound of the brush strokes and the other girl’s breathing. 

It was during such a moment that the dream had come back to her, the one she’d been having nightly since the attack. Back in that alley, the men, the certain knowledge that she was going to die here. In her dream, the man on top of her pulled a knife from his belt, and she jolted to full wakefulness, a cry of terror escaping her before she could stop it.

Shae jumped and cried out herself, startled from her own meditation. She scooted over on the bed so she could look Sansa in the eye. “M’lady?” she inquired in her husky accent. “Did you fall asleep?”

Sansa looked back at Shae, aching to trust her. She nodded, and waited. She couldn’t bring herself to speak aloud what she dreamed about, but Shae seemed different, like she would maybe understand without having to be told...

Shae reached out slowly, touching Sansa’s cheek, below the bruise on her eye that had faded to a pale yellow. “Were you dreaming of the riots?” And Sansa felt something loosen in her chest, a tight knot that had been there since she’d seen her father’s head on a spike.

“I dream about it every night,” she blurted. “I can’t stop thinking about it, Shae! Every night I dream about it, and it always gets worse, and-“

“Shhh. It’s alright, m’lady. They can’t hurt you again. They’re dead, and you’re safe.” Shae’s words were sincere enough, but the tone of her voice was flat, as if she was saying something she’d been told to say.

“What would they have done to me?” Sansa hadn’t known she was going to ask the question until it fell from her lips. “Those men…I know what they wanted. I know a little about how…parts fit together. But I’ve heard that men crave other things…less natural things…what were they going to do? Please, Shae, please tell me.”

“You don’t want to hear about that,” Shae responded, a little more of her commoner bluntness creeping into her voice. A shadow crossed her lovely face. “And I don’t want to talk about it. My lady.”

“Please, Shae! I know everyone thinks I’m a stupid child, that I can’t understand, but I know…I know you know things,” she trailed off. It was true. She’d had her suspicions about Shae, and the look on her face just now confirmed them.

“Why do you want to hear about that?” Shae’s voice had an edge of anger to it now. “What good does it do you, to hear about what men do to women when there’s no consequences? What purpose will it serve except to give you worse nightmares and make more work for me?”

The truth came out of Sansa before she could think about the risk of speaking it. “I need to know! I need to prepare for it. Because whatever they would have done to me…” she took a trembling breath. “Joffrey will do worse. When we’re married.”

Shae bit her lip, and twisted her hands in her lap, but she did not disagree.

“It’s only a question of when those things happen to me, not if,” Sansa continued. “I can accept that, but I need to know what…I can’t stand not knowing. I can handle pain, but I hate feeling stupid.”

Shae clasped Sansa’s hands in hers as if they were old friends. “I won’t let that happen to you.”

Sansa smiled bitterly. “Do you really believe that? That you could stop the King from doing whatever he wants with me?”

Shae smiled slyly. “I have more power than you think, m’lady.”

Sansa surprised herself by laughing. Her handmaiden just looked so serious, her eyes burning like black stars. She barked laughter once, twice, then suddenly she found herself sobbing. Not delicate lady’s tears, either. These were sobs pulled violently from her body, making her shake. Once they began she realized she had no ability to stop them.

She felt Shae wrap her skinny arms around her, her face pulled into the handmaiden’s black curls. She felt herself being rocked gently, heard Shae whispering soothing words into her ear. After a moment Sansa realized she couldn’t understand the language Shae was speaking, but her voice was kind, and her hands stroked Sansa’s hair, and she felt herself break silently against her servant. How long had it been since someone had touched her with love? That made her think of her mother, which made her cry harder, and although she was wracked with fresh sobs several more times, Shae’s grip on her never loosened.


	2. Chapter 2

At some point she had fallen asleep like that, wrapped up like a child in Shae’s arms. When she woke the handmaiden was gone, but it was clear she’d made a cursory attempt to put her to bed. Her gown had been loosened and her shoes removed, and a pitcher of water was on the table. 

Sansa sat up, squinting in the morning light. She realized that she felt better, as if some of the poisonous feeling she’d been carrying had bled out in the night. The grief over the past and fear of the future hadn’t subsided, but she was no longer engulfed in the haze she’d been in since the riot. She was also thirsty, she noticed. It had been days since she’d felt thirst or hunger, had taken nourishment in because she knew she’d be forced to if she refused. Now she crossed to the table, poured herself a goblet of water, and drank it greedily. So simple an act: she thirsted, and tended to her thirst. But even that small act of caring for herself grounded her, made her feel more real.

 _I am Sansa Stark,_ she thought as she gazed out her window at the brilliant blue sky. _My home is Winterfell. My family sigil is the direwolf. Our line stretches back eight thousand years. No one can take that from me._

There was a quiet knock at the door, and for the first time since the attempted rape she didn’t jump. Her pulse quickened a little, but she thought of the snow falling outside the window of her childhood bedroom, and soon it stilled.

Shae entered the room along with another chambermaid, a chestnut-haired Tyroshi who Sansa was fairly certain belonged to Cersei. She couldn’t speak to Shae in front of her, but she tried to catch her eye and offer the smallest of smiles.

“The Queen has invited you to break your fast with her, milady,” the other handmaiden chirped. Sansa nodded, and let them dress her, then instructed the chestnut-haired girl to clean the room while she was gone. She wanted Shae to escort her alone, hoped for a chance to thank her for her kindness last night.

She opened the door and her heart plunged to her feet. Standing outside in the hall was Meryn Trant. He smiled like a snake at the two of them, and Sansa had to fight the urge to slam the door in his face. She’d managed to avoid him since that horrible day Joffrey had had him beat her in front of court. Or perhaps Lord Tyrion had found ways to keep him away from her. He had seemed genuinely upset at the scene in the throne room, and there’d been no more incidents so cruel since he’d put a stop to it.

Now she saw Ser Meryn outside her chamber, and her fear of him returned in a rush, clouding her senses. “What are you doing here?” she heard herself ask. Shae gripped her arm in a warning.

The knight’s smile didn’t fade. “Here to make sure you go where you’ve been told. Can’t have you trying to run off again, not after the mess you got yourself into in Fleabottom.”

Sansa’s jaw dropped, but she forced it closed. He could say whatever he wanted to her, as long as he wasn’t going to touch her. She lifted her head and walked past him into the hall, Shae following behind.

As Shae walked past Ser Meryn he reached out and grasped her upper arm. “You’re not invited.”

Shae whirled around to face him, eyes blazing. “I’m going to escort milady to breakfast,” she snapped. The anger in her voice was unmistakable, and Sansa’s stomach dropped. But Ser Meryn continued to smile.

“I can do the job myself. You’re not needed. Unless you’d like to keep me company.” He pulled Shae toward him and grabbed her rear through her dress with an ugly laugh. 

Shae shoved herself away from him and screamed “Don’t touch me!” The smile dropped from Ser Meryn’s face in a flash and he stepped forward, his fist raised. Sansa felt a protest rising in her throat, but before she could plead on her friend’s behalf a hoarse bellow echoed down the hall.

“For fuck’s sake, Trant, don’t you have anything better to do?” The Hound stormed down the hall toward the three of them, mud on his boots and breeches, but his white cloak clean. “The sworn protector of the king, wasting his time slapping around chambermaids?”

“Did you hear what this bitch said to me?” Ser Meryn growled, releasing Shae and turning to face the bigger man.

“She hurt your feelings?” the Hound sneered. “Are you really so stupid that the fact that women don’t like you comes as a surprise? Fuck off down to the stables. The King needs his horse prepared.”

For a moment the two men glared at each other, then Trant muttered another curse at Shae and stalked away. Sansa opened her mouth to thank Clegane, got as far as “Ser…” but he interrupted her by turning to Shae.

“You,” he snapped. “Get back to the kitchens. I’ll see she gets delivered properly. Find some pots to scrub out.”

Shae was still breathing hard, two spots of red burning in her cheeks. “I don’t work in the kitchens,” she hissed.

The Hound closed the distance between them in a breath, gripped Shae’s chin between his thumb and forefinger. “I know what you do,” he breathed into her face. “Don’t think just because the Queen is too stupid to figure it out that no one else has. If you were half-smart, you’d keep your mouth shut.” He squeezed his hand, forcing Shae’s lips slightly apart. “When it’s not full of the Imp’s cock.”

Shae wrenched herself free from his grip and stood there, trembling with anger. As the two of them locked furious eyes, Sansa realized the Hound had spoken the truth about the mysterious foreign beauty. The more she considered it, the more sense it made. Though the thought of her friend and the Imp together caused Sansa a brief wave of disgust, it was soon replaced by a still compassion. _She’s doing what she must to survive,_ Sansa thought. _The same as I must. Can I really hold that against her?_

Shae turned on her heel and hurried down the hall, almost breaking into a run. In that moment Sansa was certain she was seeing the last of the only person in King’s Landing she trusted, and spoke without thinking.

“Shae!” she called. “Please meet me back here at dusk. To escort me to the godswood.” She caught the girl’s eyes and tried to send a message with her own. _I don’t care where you’re from or what you’ve done, I can’t lose you. Please don’t make me lose you._

Shae met Sansa’s blue eyes with her black ones, and the same stillness Sansa felt seemed to wash over her as well. “Of course milady.” Her voice was quiet, but did not waver. She continued down the hall at a walk this time, leaving Sansa alone with the Hound.

Now that he was standing so close, it was impossible to miss the smell of wine wafting off him. Could he be drunk this early in the morning? Perhaps he hadn’t slept; his eyes were bloodshot and he seemed to be swaying a bit on his feet. Sansa couldn’t imagine the amount a man his size would have to drink to be staggering drunk, but she hadn’t seen much of him in the last few days. Perhaps drinking was all he’d done.

He tilted his head down the hall with a scowl, and she straightened her back and walked ahead of him. She heard his footsteps behind her, and was able to detect a slight unevenness in his gait. 

“Stay outside the door when we get there,” she said, trying to sound more confident than she felt. “Don’t follow me into the room with the Queen.”

“The little bird gives orders now.” He was much closer behind her than she’d thought, and she felt a chill run down the back of her neck. “Why should I do anything you say?”

Sansa thought of Cersei, tried to summon the Queen’s authority into her voice. “You’re drunk,” she answered. “If I can tell, the Queen will certainly be able to. She’ll tell the King. You’ll be punished.”

“This city is making a good liar of you, Little Bird. I almost believed you care.”

Sansa stopped and turned to face him. “You saved my life. Consider this my return of the favor.”

He surprised her by looking at the floor rather than her face. “I did you no favor.”

“You stopped those men. They were going to hurt me.”

He looked at her now, his face twisting into a smirk. “And I’m sure you’re grateful to be returned to the Lannisters instead. You think your betrothed has anything better in store for you than what those scum had?”

It was almost exactly what she had said to Shae the night before, and it shocked Sansa into momentary silence. Joffrey’s face formed in her mind, and at the thought of being bedded by him she felt the tears rise in her again. But she thought of Shae, of her mother and Arya, and clenched her fists by her sides and forced the tears down. _I won’t cry. Not in front of him. Never again._

She forced herself to look up into Sandor Clegane’s scarred face, his grey eyes that brimmed with hate. “No,” she said, her voice almost a whisper. “I don’t suppose he does.” 

She turned and continued down the hall before he could come back with another taunt. She kept her head high and her fists clenched, and did not look around to see if he followed. For a few seconds she heard nothing, then the sound of his footsteps behind her resumed.

——

Nothing could have surprised the Hound more than Sansa Stark speaking cold truths into his face, then walking away from him without a backward glance. She strode down the hallway as if she owned the place. She’d grown a few inches taller since he’d first laid eyes on her. He wondered if she knew it. It seemed she knew more than he thought.

He shouldn’t have said those things to her about Joffrey. The walls had ears, and the King was becoming more unpredictable by the day. Gods knew what he’d do if he found out his loyal dog had spoken out of turn about him, and to his wife-to-be no less. It was the drink, eroding his caution. He’d only wanted to slap her back down with his words, punish her for ordering him about, presuming to protect him. He’d expected her to cry, or order him out of her sight. But she’d held his gaze, and left him feeling like the foolish one.

There was still a smudge of a yellow bruise around her eye, he had noticed. That, more than anything, was probably why the King had let her be these last few days. He liked her pretty; he always instructed Trant and the other knights to leave her face when he had them beat her. That would change after they married, Sandor knew. Then Joffrey would be doing the beating himself, and he had no such self-control.

He watched the casual grace with which she moved, and wondered if he’d be able to stand walking behind her when she was hobbling. It wouldn’t take Joffrey long to break down this new-found confidence of hers; it would only make him enjoy the breaking more. Soon her blue eyes would turn grey, her straight back would bend, her hands, so still at her sides now, would shake with every breath. The little bird with her wings broken.

Sandor Clegane did not permit himself to feel sadness; such emotions were either dismissed or channeled into violence, where they could be made useful. So he put the mental image of Sansa Stark’s bruised face aside, and focused on a much more satisfying one: wringing Joffrey’s neck until his eyeballs ran down his cheeks like jelly. That was better; that felt _right._ Soothed, he followed Sansa to the Queen’s chambers, hung back when she reached the correct room. His anger wrapped around him like a cloak.

He took that anger down the training yard, and had not been sparring for twenty minutes before he managed to break a yellow-haired squire’s nose. A warmth spread through him as the little cunt howled in pain, a rush through the chest and out to his fingertips that he’d taught himself to believe was happiness. He hoisted his practice sword high and turned to the wide-eyed boys around him, boys it was his job to prepare for battle. Things felt right again.

“Alright, who’s next?” he taunted. “Come on, don’t all volunteer at once!”


	3. Chapter 3

Sansa went to breakfast expecting an interrogation from Cersei at best, fresh torture from Joffrey at the worst. To her great relief, the Queen’s chambers contained only Cersei herself and Prince Tommen. She greeted Sansa cordially and invited her to sit on her left side, across from the little prince.

It was as painless as any time spent with Lannisters could be. Tommen babbled happily about the new pups that had been born in the kennel, about the names he had already picked out for all of them and how soon they would be old enough to learn tricks. Cersei doted on her son and made polite conversation with Sansa about the preparations for her wedding gown. It was almost possible to forget that she was a prisoner here; the armed guards posted by the door, and the way Cersei’s smiles never reached her eyes, were the only clues.

As Sansa took her leave of them, she wondered if she’d been invited here because the Queen missed her daughter. The pain on Cersei’s face had been clear when they all stood on the dock to see Princess Myrcella off to Dorne.

_King’s Landing is where pain is made,_ she thought. _Its limitless resource, its chief export to the world. Pain and lies._

As she made her way back to her chambers, she passed the training yard. The Hound was out there, swinging a sparring sword with such force that Sansa found herself fearing for his pupils even though she knew the blade was dull.

A dark-haired squire, almost as tall as Clegane but whip-thin where the Kingsguard was muscular, was doing a good job of drawing the bigger man out, avoiding the swings of the blade and using the the opportunities left by his wild movements to inch closer. Soon he was inside the Hound’s guard, and managed to lock blades with him. A perfectly-timed twist, and the Hound’s blade flew from his grasp as the squire whooped with triumph.

The squire only looked away for a split second, but it was enough for the Hound to catch his sword hand and drag him forward. He wrenched the blade free, put a fist in the squire’s stomach and sent him flying backward into the mud.

“You think the man you’re about to kill is going to let you pause to savor it?” he roared as the lad picked himself off the ground. “The kill is there for you, you _take it._ You hesitate, and you’ll be the dead one!”

The boys watching, none of them older than six-and-ten, nodded gravely.

_This is how it happens,_ Sansa thought. _They start as children, and the world turns them into monsters._

She’d be married to one of those monsters soon enough. They ruled the world, and they would rule her life. There was nothing she could do.

She watched as the Hound squared off with another boy, a sick grin on his face. _Killing is the sweetest thing there is,_ he’d told her once, trying to scare her. At the time she was scared of him, and had believed what he said. Or at least believed that he believed.

Now she thought of the way Cersei had smiled at her, her eyes the eyes of a cat amongst a flock of pigeons. 

_Power,_ she thought. _Power is the sweetest thing there is. Killing is just the only power he has._

The sun came out from behind a cloud then, washing her in warmth and lighting up her hair like a brand. She saw his eyes flick to her for the briefest of seconds, noticing her watching him, then darted away. She stayed until he paused for breath and looked up at her again. She kept her face blank, and thought of the snows of Winterfell, and after a long moment he turned away from her. Then, and only then, did she continue on her way.

——

Despite their exchange in the hallway, Sansa had feared that Shae would flee the city as soon as she got clear of the Hound. So it was with deep relief that she greeted her friend when the handmaiden arrived at dusk, to accompany her to her evening prayers.

Shae was silent as she walked beside her lady, keeping her eyes down whenever they passed anyone. Not until they reached the hush of the godswood did she speak, her breath coming out of her in a rush.

“Do you hate me?” 

Sansa drew back in surprise at her directness. No one asked her questions like that anymore.

“Of course not,” she replied. “You’re the only person in this city I don’t hate.”

“Even though I’m a foreign whore?” 

Now it was Sansa’s turn to reach forward and cup the other woman’s cheek. “You’re here with me. You’re my only friend in this whole city. Whatever you’ve done to get here, I could never hate you for it.”

Shae’s eyes sparkled in the gloom. With tears? Sansa could not imagine the stoic girl crying. They clasped hands for a moment, then Sansa felt an embarrassed smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.

“What?” Shae’s tone was still quiet, but now tinged with amusement.

“It’s just-“ Sansa grasped for her manners. “How does it work? With him so…oddly-shaped?”

Shae laughed. “It’s my job to make it work, my dear.”

“Does it hurt, with him? I’ve heard things about him. Is he as cruel as the rest of his family?”

She shook her head slowly. “I was not forced to take his coin. I would not have come here with him if I didn’t enjoy his company some of the time.”

Sansa’s eyes widened. “So you do, then? Enjoy his…company?”

Shae laughed again, louder, then remembered her surroundings and quieted herself. “As much as a woman can enjoy a man, my dear. They’re not all beasts when you’re alone with them.”

Sansa knew she was being rude by prying, but could not help herself. “And it doesn’t bother you, how he’s older, and the way he looks? You still don’t mind touching him that way?”

Shae sighed, and seemed to consider her words carefully. “Think on the men you’ve met since you left home, Sansa,” she said quietly. “Have the kind men and the beautiful men been the same men?”

_Joffrey_ , she thought, and replied, “I see what you mean.”

Shae seemed to understand what she was thinking, and drew close to her, now whispering. “I meant what I said, milady. I can try to protect you from him. I can try to convince Tyrion to get you away from him.”

“Lord Tyrion won’t betray his family for a girl he’s barely spoken to,” Sansa retorted. “You know he’s smarter than that.”

“Perhaps the King can be convinced to put you aside. Marry someone else.”

Sansa shook her head. “I’m still Ned Stark’s daughter. I’m the most valuable marriage prospect available to him. He won’t just let me go.”

“Let me help you, Sansa. Please.”

Sansa embraced her, the contact giving her strength. “You can help me by not leaving me. Promise me, Shae? That you won’t leave me alone here?”

“I promise,” Shae breathed into her hair. 

They pulled apart, and Shae fell silent to allow Sansa to pray. Sansa knelt before the wierwood, gazing into its twisted face.

_Winterfell_ , she thought. _I come from Winterfell. On cold mornings my mother and I would drink hot cider and watch my brothers chase each other through the snow._

She stayed there in the blessed silence as it fell dark, and prayed, and thought of all the things that had happened that no one could take away from her.


	4. Chapter 4

Weeks passed, and Sansa went where she was told and reacted about news of the war the way she was expected to. Despite the way that messengers tried to phrase things favorably to the King, it was obvious to Sansa that Robb was winning the war handily. The hope that she might be rescued began to grow in her once more.

Now that Shae’s true purpose in King’s Landing was no longer a secret to Sansa, the two women began to crave each other’s company more and more. Sansa gave Shae instruction on how better to disguise herself as a servant raised among nobles. In return, Shae taught her young charge about men. At first Sansa had been shocked at the breadth of her friend’s knowledge and experience, but could not deny her curiosity as well. When she was a girl at Winterfell, the act of physical love had been a hazy mystery to her, something her mother had alluded to in the gentlest terms possible. Then she’d come to King’s Landing, and the cold reality of what she would face as a married woman had overwhelmed her. Shae’s tales of her experiences with men high and low took a great deal of the mystery and fear out of it for Sansa. Sitting on the floor of her chamber, or whispering to each other in the godswood, Shae would sometimes make her shake with laughter with stories of the foolishness that men’s urges led them to. Other times she patiently answered Sansa’s hundreds of questions, explaining to her what men wanted and how women could take pleasure from it. Where before her new womanly figure had seemed an uncomfortable burden, Sansa began to understand the power that she could wield with it. 

Besides her evening talks with Shae, she had added another daily habit of watching the knights and the squires in the training yard. While still uninterested in the specifics of combat, she found herself fascinated by the movements of the men as they pretended to hurt and kill one another. Fresh pupils were brought in almost daily, and Sansa would follow their progress as they went from clumsily flailing their limbs to moving with deadly fluidity. Some of them noticed her watching them, and made attempts to show off, and she would watch with her face a blank mask and think of power.

One of the men who always noticed when she was watching was Sandor Clegane. The first few times he had scowled at her, but when she refused to acknowledge it he seemed resolved to ignore her. If being watched bothered him, it didn’t diminish his fighting skill in the slightest. Again and again she saw him humiliate younger, quicker men. The boys were frightened of him, that was plain to see, but each one eventually squared off with him, desperate to be the one to distinguish themselves by beating the Hound. Each time they failed, and Sansa found herself looking forward to those moments the most. His movements would come with an easy grace, and on his scarred face he would wear an expression almost like serenity. Occasionally in those moments he would accidentally make eye contact with her, and it would cause a rush of blood through her body, from the top of her head to her feet. She couldn’t explain what it was. There was just something about watching someone do exactly what he was made for that made her feel both soothed and agitated at the same time.

She tried to explain this feeling to Shae once, and her confidante had smiled knowingly. “Be careful he doesn’t catch you staring too much, my dear,” she said gently. “Men can interpret things like that…in a way you wouldn’t want.”

Sansa understood what Shae was implying and tried to be more discreet, but found herself thinking of such implications more and more, and with less fear.

They were not good days; she sensed there would be no more truly good days for her. But they were days when she wasn’t always thinking of pain and loss and blood, and she savored them as if they were a warm fire on a freezing night.

Then her monthly bleeding had been discovered, despite her attempts to hide it. Cersei began to talk of her and Joffrey marrying in earnest, perhaps within the next week, and her hope was snuffed out. Robb would not win the war and free her in a week. Before she could be rescued, she would be Joffrey’s wife. His property. Despair, black and sticky as tar, crept over her, and with it the dreams of the rapers resumed. Shae saw her pain, and tried to comfort her, but once again she saw the world through a haze, the people moving about like shadows.

On the evening after her ill-fated bleeding had finally stopped, two maids bustled into her room with a fresh gown and brushes. “Feast tonight, milady,” one of them explained. “Clegane has brought back quite a haul, and the King wants you by his side to celebrate.”

“The Hound?” Sansa inquired. “What has he brought His Grace?”

“Not the Hound, milady,” the other girl piped up. “The other Clegane. Ser Gregor the Mountain. He’s been sacking villages in the Riverlands and just brought his party back today.”

The Mountain That Rides. Sansa had never spoken to him, had been terrified of him. It wasn’t his size, but the brutality in his dead eyes. Even his brother was afraid of him. Sansa remembered the story Littlefinger had told her, about how Sandor Clegane had gotten his scars. Gregor had just been a small boy when he’d held his little brother to the fire. Sansa could not imagine what such a man that boy had grown into could be capable of. She couldn’t think of anyone she wanted to dine with less.

She let her maids dress her and style her hair, instructing them to make her look as modest as possible. She’d go to the feast and sit beside Joffrey and be as quiet and small as she could, and if the gods were merciful he’d soon grow bored with her and dismiss her. 

“Where’s Shae?” she asked. She’d feel stronger with her only friend helping her prepare.

“Haven’t seen her, milady,” the maid styling her hair answered. Then she giggled. “P’raps she’s tending to the Imp.”

The other maid giggled as well, and Sansa resolved not to mention Shae again tonight. The walls had ears.

When she arrived at the Great Hall, the feast had already begun. She noticed that Lord Tyrion was nowhere to be seen. Queen Cersei was there, sitting to Joffrey’s right and gazing impassively over the revelry, but Sansa hardly recognized anyone else. Gregor Clegane was seated at the high table, telling a story that had Joffrey roaring with laughter. Sansa realized with dread that she would be required to sit between the two of them.

_Small and quiet,_ she thought as she was guided to her seat. _Don’t attract his attention._

The spoils that had been brought back from the Riverlands turned out to include a cellar full of Riverrun mead. “Aged twenty years,” the Queen had explained as a goblet was poured for Sansa. Cersei herself was already through her second cup, and her face was flushed. “We’ll likely not see its kind again, now that the Riverlands are burning. Have a taste, child.”

Sansa sipped the honey wine and fought her urge to pull a face. It was the strongest drink she’d ever tasted, and burned in her belly when swallowed.

Joffrey laughed, and slung an arm about her shoulders as he took a long drink from his own cup. “Tully mead and my Tully bride,” he slurred, and Sansa realized that he was blind drunk. “Will you taste as sweet, my beloved? How’s a Riverlands redhead like to be bedded, Clegane?” He leaned toward the Mountain, and his hand crept over Sansa’s shoulder and brushed the swell of her breast.

Ser Gregor looked up from the massive plate of food before him, his eyes as cold as ever. “Never matters to me what they like,” he grunted. 

Joffrey barked with laughter, too drunk to care that the knight hadn’t addressed him properly. Out of the corner of her eye, Sansa spotted the Queen getting up from the table. She murmured an excuse to her son about being tired, and was escorted from the great hall. Sansa saw her clutch her handmaiden’s shoulder as she walked, so as not to show the effect of the strong drink.

The celebration raged on, and one by one the nobles of the court made their excuses and left, or were carried out by their attendants when they became too drunk to walk. As the plates were cleared away Sansa looked up and realized that besides the serving girls she was the only woman left in the hall. The sounds of drunken men shouting echoed off the walls, growing louder and fuller in her head until it took all her resolve not to clap her hands over her ears.

The Mountain continued to regale Joffrey with tales of the Tully men he’d slaughtered and the Riverlands women he’d raped. Joffrey listened to him with terrifying avidity, more than once pressing close to Sansa in an attempt to hear him better. Wedged between the two of them, Sansa felt a growing panic rising in her chest. She would scream soon, she knew, and awake something in the beasts that surrounded her. Suddenly she became certain that if she didn’t find some way out of this room, any way, she was going to lose her maidenhead right here on this table, while all these drunken men watched and laughed.

She moved with instinct, not thought. The next time Joffrey leaned against her to say something to Ser Gregor, she moved away just slightly so he overbalanced. He put a hand out blindly to steady himself and sent the plate holding her untouched dessert sliding into her lap, staining her gown.

“Stupid bitch!” he snarled. “I ought to make you eat that off the floor!”

“I’m so sorry, your Grace, please forgive me,” she whimpered. “The wine…I’m not used to something so strong.”

“Go get cleaned up,” Joffrey snapped. “I can’t have my bride-to-be sitting beside me looking like a scullery maid.” He was so drunk he could barely get the sentence out.

Sansa nodded and rose from the table. She had no intention of returning to the hall this night; even if the King punished her in the morning for disobeying him, it would be better than whatever was going to happen in this room if she stayed.

A few people looked at her as she passed, but no one moved to follow her. Shaking with relief, she left the sound of the drunken men behind her and into the quiet darkness of the sleeping castle.


	5. Chapter 5

For the first time since the death of her father, Sansa Stark walked through the halls glad to be alone. Everyone in the palace was asleep, or drunk, or busy at work, and she passed not a soul as she wandered down the unfamiliar passages. She thought the way she was going led back to her chambers, but she must have taken a wrong turn. When she came to some stairs, she headed up them instead of turning back. 

The thought of attempting to escape crossed her mind briefly; a better chance might never present itself, with the royal family drunk and most of the guards occupied. But she dismissed the notion almost as quickly. Even if she were somehow able to make it out of the castle and to the city gates, what would she do then? Walk all the way back to Winterfell? There would be Lannister soldiers out there, and bandits, and desperate men who would try to ransom her. She’d be lucky if being caught and dragged back to Joffrey was the worst of it.

 _Perhaps he’d send Ser Gregor to find me_ , she thought, and the idea made her swoon with terror. 

The crushing hopelessness of her situation fell on her once again. She was imprisoned by walls and swords now, and soon enough she would be imprisoned by her marriage. Joffrey would use her however he pleased, and when she bore him heirs he would probably have her killed. The worst of it was that her father had been willing to arrange the marriage, had put her in the path of this monster without knowing what he was getting her into. Even the men she trusted, the men who loved her, only managed to hurt her in the end.

She thought of what Shae had told her in the godswood about men, and wondered where her friend was now. She’d noticed that Lord Tyrion wasn’t at the feast either, and reasoned that they were together, taking whatever pleasure they could in their strange arrangement. She hoped what Shae had said about enjoying his company was true, and she wondered how much power over such a powerful man Shae truly had.

Sansa reconsidered what Shae had said, about convincing Joffrey to put her aside. But she could think of no one else that the King could marry that would give him a claim over so much land, as well as the family of one of his enemies. She knew there were some honorable houses that had daughters of marriageable age, the Tyrells, the Freys, but they were all pledged to the wrong people or had comparatively little in the way of land holdings. Moreover, she suspected Joffrey was too eager to torture her on their wedding night, to let such an opportunity slip away.

She passed a narrow window and caught a glimpse of a sweeping view of the city, and realized she had found her way to the White Sword Tower. Most of the doors she was now passing were shut, but a few stood open, and by the bareness of the rooms within she guessed that these were the quarters of guards and lesser knights. The hallway ended in a large common area, as sparely appointed as the rooms. A handful of chairs and tables were gathered around a fireplace. The fire had burned low but was still lit. The nights had begun to get cold even this far south, and the servants efforts to keep the palace warm had doubled recently.

There was no sound but the gentle hiss of the flames and the sound of her own quiet footfalls. She took a seat closest to the fire and stared into the flames, trying to think of Winterfell and find peace within her.

Instead the fire made her think of Sandor Clegane. He’d been nowhere in sight at the feast, she had noticed, and would probably continue to make himself scarce until his brother was back out in the field. She couldn’t blame him. Without those scars that his brother had given him, he might have grown to be a normal man. She tried to picture him as something other than as Joffrey’s dog, a regular knight, still skilled with a blade but driven by something other than animal rage. He might have even had a family. But Gregor had stolen that future, given him the scars that would forever define him and turned him into the Hound. How quickly and senselessly a person’s fortune could change.

He was a prisoner of his face, she a prisoner of her name. As long as her name was Stark she was doomed to be sold as a brood-mare. What a stupid child she’d been, to have once viewed the possibility with excitement. She envied Shae, a commoner free to make her own way in the world, taking only the men into her bed that could provide her with something she needed in return. Noblewomen had no such freedom; the only highborn girls who managed to escape being sold into marriage were the ones too ugly for any man to want.

There was an iron poker laid against the wall, and Sansa grasped it and stirred it through the embers, watching the metal begin to glow. An idea was forming in her head, something huge and terrible.

 _I could take the iron to my face,_ she thought. _Burn myself. Joffrey wouldn’t want a Queen with a scarred face; he could barely stand to look at me when I had one stupid bruise. He’d put me aside. He’d have to._

There would be pain, she knew, but it would be a quick pain that she controlled. Surely it couldn’t hurt as much as being Joffrey’s wife, bearing his children. But she must do it now, quickly, before she lost her courage.

The tip of the poker was bright red now. Sansa withdrew it from the fire, her hand trembling only slightly, and brought the iron up, meant to press it to her cheek in one fluid motion, too quick for the pain to stop her.

From behind her, a voice shattered the silence, so loud it seemed to come from the walls themselves.

_“What the bloody FUCK are you doing?”_

Blind panic overtook her, and the iron fell from her grasp and landed across her lap. Even through the fabric of her dress the pain was instant and nauseating, and she reflexively reached to push it away without thought. She had one second to realize that she was about to burn her hands to crisps before it was snatched away from her.

The Hound stood over her, his scarred face twisted with fury. He hurled the iron against the wall, the resulting clang loud enough to hurt her ears but not as loud as his cursing. She cried out in terror and he turned to her, grabbing her wrists and dragging her to her feet.

“Start talking, Little Bird,” he growled. “And if you’re going to lie to me you better hope you do it well, or I’ll fucking tear you in half.”

Sansa opened her mouth with no idea what she was planning to say, but then the sound of raised voices echoed from far down the hall. Sandor heard them at the same time, and swore again.

Wordlessly, he gripped her by the arm and marched her from the common room. She thought he was going to deliver her to the guards and struggled to get away, but she didn’t have to struggle for long. A few paces and he shoved her into one of the empty bedrooms she had passed, then followed her in and shut the door behind them.

“Not a sound,” he told her. She nodded and shrank against the far wall. For a few terrible minutes they waited, she struggling to catch her breath while keeping quiet, he staring at her with a mix of anger and fear on his face she’d never seen before. The sounds of the guards grew louder as they came to investigate, but with no one in sight and nothing out of place except one of the pokers for the fire, they quickly grew bored and left. Their voices faded away and the hall was washed in silence once again.

He nodded and moved away from the door, and Sansa let out the breath she’d been holding and let herself sink into a seated position on the bed. The Hound towered over her, and for the first time in weeks she found herself once again afraid to look him in the face.

“Give me one good reason not to bring you straight to the King and tell him what you did,” he rasped.

Sansa forced herself to look at him, and spoke the first truth that came to mind. “He’s with your brother.”

Despite her fear, Sansa felt a touch of triumph that for a moment she had managed to render the Hound speechless.

Then he sighed, and clutched his temples with one large hand as if his head pained him. “What were you thinking, Little Bird?”

“Joffrey, he…” Sansa fought to keep her voice from shaking. “He likes me to be pretty. If I’m not pretty anymore…if I won’t ever be again…maybe he won’t-“

She glanced guiltily upward as the implication of what she was saying dawned on her. 

The pain on the Hound’s face made his grating laughter all the more horrible.

“That’s the way of it, isn’t it?” he snarled. “A few burns on your face and the pampered little king won’t be able to stand to look at you, let alone fuck you.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-“

He leaned forward, trapping her between his posted arms, their faces close.

“You think me a virgin, Little Bird?”

She wondered if her speechlessness was as satisfying to him as his had been to her.

“A dark room and enough coin to make the night worth it, girl. That’s all it takes. And Joffrey stands to gain more from you than any whore ever got from me. Even if he didn’t want you, the other Lannisters want you badly enough not to care what you look like. It’s your claim they care about, not your face.”

Sansa felt her chin tremble, steeled her resolve not to cry in front of this man. 

But, oh gods, he was right, every horrible thing he said was right, she’d never be free as long as the Lannisters could make her one of their own…

He was so close to her. She could feel the heat of him, smell the training-yard smell of leather and metal and men’s sweat. But no wine. Wherever he had been tonight, it hadn’t been the taverns.

“Why are you here, girl?”

So close, and with his voice so low, she felt the words more than she heard them.

“His Grace,” she whispered, twisting her hands in her lap. “And Ser Gregor. They’re drunk, and…I was sitting with them, he’s talking about the war and…I just got scared, I couldn’t stay…”

She couldn’t look at him. She might have been able to explain it to Shae, the panic she felt in that room that fairly reeked of violence. But surely the Hound could not understand how small and vulnerable she had felt then.

She cringed, expecting him to call her stupid, call her a coward, a spineless little girl. 

Instead she felt his callused hand under her chin, tilting her face up to look at him.

He still looked angry. He always looked angry. But his voice was gentle when he said, “Getting away from there might have been the smartest thing you’ve done, I’ll grant you that. But you’ve hardly come to a safer place now.”

Sansa’s eyes widened. Until now, his lust for her and her awareness of it had been unspoken, so deeply denied and concealed that she had at times wondered if it had only been her imagination. This was the closest either of them had come to mentioning it, and it brought her surroundings to the forefront of her thoughts. She was in his chambers. No one knew she was here, not even Shae, and the halls were deserted, everyone drunk or asleep.

She should have been terrified. And instead…

“I feel safe with you.” She met his eyes and spoke the truth, exactly the way he had vowed always to do with her.

He made a sound somewhere between a growl and a laugh. “You’re a fool.”

“You protect me,” she reasoned. “You’ve always protected me.”

“I’ve kept you a prisoner here, the same as the rest of them.”

“You’re not like them,” Sansa answered. “I know…I know what you want from me. I see you look at me. I saw the way you looked at me after you saved me from those men-“

His face twisted, as if in disgust. “You don’t know a fucking thing.”

“But you’re different from the rest of them. Joffrey does what he likes with me, Ser Meryn and Ser Boros practically jump at the chance to hurt me, they enjoy it, but you-“

He kissed her then.

Her body tensed in surprise, but she felt no urge to pull away. In that moment she felt herself completely unable to think about his scars, or his capacity for violence. She was only aware of the roughness of his mouth against hers, so different from that time she had kissed Joffrey. One of his hands was on her back, the other snarled in her hair, and she could feel them faintly trembling as he clutched her.

 _Is he afraid?_ she wondered. Then he broke the kiss and looked at her. She stared up into his eyes, piercing them and finding a deep, wounded confusion down beneath the anger.

“Still think yourself safe with me, Sansa?” He’d never called her by her true name before. It felt as if there was a thunderstorm brewing in the tiny room, the air charged and heavy with power.

Before she could speak there was a pounding on the door that made them both jump.

Sandor cursed again and motioned for her to stand behind the door. She obeyed, and the casual way he swung the door open and the way he snarled “What?” betrayed nothing to the servant outside.

“Apologies, my lord,” the interloper stammered. “It’s just there’s been a problem with your…with Ser Gregor. Seems he took a fancy to one of the serving wenches after the King passed out. Broke the poor girl’s arm when she tried to get away from him.”

The Hound snorted, and Sansa could tell from his tone that he was rolling his eyes. “And?”

“Well, he’s flown into quite a rage since then. Shattered a table right down the middle and then started storming through the halls, cutting down anyone who’s tried to stop him. He’s maimed two gold cloaks already. The Imp wants him caught and…and subdued…before their majesties can find out about it.”

“Good fucking luck with that,” Sandor snapped, and moved to shut the door in the man’s face.

“He’s ordered _everyone_ not currently guarding their majesties to search for him, my lord. He asked after you specifically. He knows you weren’t drinking at the feast.”

Sansa could swear she could hear him grinding his teeth together. “Right. Bugger off and let me get my sword on.”

The man left with another hastily murmured apology, and once again the door was shut. Sansa stayed against the wall with her heart pounding as Sandor pulled on a shirt of chainmail and buckled his sword about his waist.

“Subdue him,” he muttered to himself. “As if I mean to leave him alive if I can bring him down.”

“You mean to kill him?” Sansa asked, eyes going wide.

He turned to her, looking like he had forgotten she was there. Sansa saw the genuine fear on his face, and the way he gripped the pommel of his sword so hard the knuckles were white. 

“Every time I see him might be my chance to kill him. I won’t miss that chance if it’s tonight.”

She was afraid for him, she realized. She hovered on the edge of asking him not to go, offering…what, exactly? To protect him? How could she protect him from the person who had already hurt him the most?

He gripped her elbow and guided her away from the door. With his other hand he touched her face, her lips, before pulling reluctantly away.

“You’d best be gone from here when I get back, Little Bird. I’ll be tempted to take more than a kiss from you, if I see you again tonight.”

She opened her mouth to speak, but by the time she found her voice he had already slammed the door behind him.

——

Somewhere in the castle, Sandor could hear the sounds of the guards (but no screams, they hadn’t found Gregor yet, thank whatever gods could be listening). He strode toward the sound and gripped the hilt of his sword, and wondered if he was about to die.

He would not regret that stolen kiss, if it was so. And if it had been as foul for the little bird as it had been sweet for him, so much the better. Perhaps she’d learned, finally, that she could trust no one.

_I feel safe with you._

He hated that she’d said those words. Hated the way it made his head swim, hated how it made his hands itch to touch her, hated, _hated…_

_You protect me. You’ve always protected me._

As if all he’d protected her from had done anything but preserve her for Joffrey, ripening her innocence to make her breaking and bleeding all the sweeter.

If she had an ounce of sense she’d be just as repulsed by him as by the king or Meryn Trant. And so he’d tried to show her, certain that when he kissed her she would scream in horror or disgust, push him away. She hadn’t, and he could only suppose she had been paralyzed by fear. 

He wondered if she would thank the gods for Gregor Clegane the next time she prayed in the godswood, for delivering her from the Hound’s clutches. It would be the first time any highborn girl had done so, of that Sandor was certain.

As much as he hated a lie, the one he’d told on the way out the door had been necessary. She’d scurry back to her rooms now, and the next time he saw her she would wear that schooled, rigid mask she used to hide her fear, and he’d never have to worry about her looking into his eyes and saying things like _I feel safe with you_ ever again.

And if she was still there…

He put that from his mind. He had not meant what he said, about taking more from her than a kiss. He was not his brother, nor was he the animal the Lannisters wanted him to be.

_You really think you could have controlled yourself much longer? You want her so badly it’s killing you._

_If that’s what kills me, it may well prove the Mother’s mercy truly exists,_ Sandor thought, and went to find his brother.

— —

Sansa lay on her back in the dim light, drifting in and out of sleep and wondering if this was how Queen Cersei felt all the time.

The thoughts had nothing to do with her surroundings: the room was far more modest than even she, a hostage, was used to. Sandor Clegane seemed to keep nothing in his room but clothes and weapons, and the bed, though large enough to fit a man his size, was hard. Surely a member of the Kingsguard could command better accommodations if he wished, but it made a certain sense that he would choose to live this way. He’d been called a dog for so long, he must believe it on some level.

After he had left, Sansa had loosened her stained gown and let her hair out from its pins, letting it fall over her shoulders. 

This sense of ownership over her own body, this sense that she was capable of momentous things….that must be what being a Queen felt like.

A plan had begun to form in her head, hazy but getting clearer by the second. Something monstrous, something that would disgrace her in the eyes of the gods, the realm, possibly her family.

Something that could save her from Joffrey.

The spots on her legs where she had dropped the iron across her lap were still throbbing. She sat up and pulled her shift over her knees to look. There was a faint red stripe across her thighs, but it didn’t look like something she would need to see a healer about. Not that that was an option anyway- she had no idea how she would explain such a thing.

 _How would you have explained burning your own face?_ she thought. But she hadn’t had a plan beyond that, had been inches from plunging herself into a completely unknowable future. Then Clegane had intervened, and she’d been thrust onto a completely different but no less mysterious path.

_He must hate me, for trying something like that. After what he’s been through._

But he hadn’t touched her like he hated her. He never did.

She could still feel where his hands had been when he had kissed her. 

It wasn’t something they wrote songs about; it wasn’t even something she had talked about with Shae. How starved for touch she was, how badly she ached for a strong body to lean against, a voice in her ear speaking something besides lies and poison. There would be no great romance for her, but if the Hound could offer her something that wouldn’t hurt, something that would make her forget her pain even for a minute….

_I’ll be tempted to take more than a kiss from you…_

He’d only been trying to scare her, she was sure. But he also desired her, had all but come out and said it. She knew he wouldn’t harm her, but she had something he wanted. Something she could offer him.

She lay in the dark, and drifted in that realm between sleep and waking that brings moments of perfect clarity. _My name is Sansa Stark. I come from Winterfell. When I was seven I knitted a red scarf for my father, and he wore it until a bad-tempered horse ate it. I kissed someone tonight, and no one ever knew about it but me and the man who kissed me. These are things that no one can take from me._

She lay in the dark, and thought on these things, and she waited.


	6. Chapter 6

They didn’t find the Mountain, although it wasn’t hard to find where he had been. They’d followed the path of splintered wood and broken bones through the city until they reached the Mud Gate, where a terrified gatekeeper informed them that Ser Gregor had left the city less than an hour past. He had cringed up at the Hound as he spoke, expecting his words to be met with fury, but the scarred man had only sighed wearily and motioned for the guards to turn back the way they came.

“The Imp ordered us to find him,” the guard closest to him said cautiously.

“The Imp wanted us to stop him from causing more trouble,” Sandor snapped back. “He can’t cause any trouble out in the fucking woods, none that the Imp need care about. If we’re lucky he’ll try and rut with a bear and get his cock bitten off. I’m getting some sleep.”

After that no one had dared question him, and he had stalked back to the White Sword Tower alone.

It was disappointment, he knew, making his steps heavy and his shoulders slumped. Every time Gregor came to court Sandor prepared himself for the possibility of their final fight, and every time it didn’t happen it left him with this emptiness.

He swung open the door to his room, and when he saw Sansa standing there in the meager candlelight, the shock of it set his heart to hammering in his chest.

He managed to avoid cursing loud enough to wake up the entire Keep, and shut the door behind him with a shaking hand. 

He looked at her, meaning to tell her to get the fuck out before she got them both killed, and found he couldn’t. 

“Seven hells,” he said hoarsely. “You really don’t learn, do you?”

“Did you kill him?” she replied. She might have been speaking about the weather, so light was her tone.

He removed his sword belt, chuckling weakly as he did. “Do you think I’d have come back here if I had? I’d have taken his head to the finest brothel in the city. Watched those whores line up to thank me from ridding them of him.” 

“In a way, that’s rather gallant.” 

He turned away so she wouldn’t see his astonishment that she was actually taunting him. He tugged the chainmail over his head, and when he felt it catch and pull his tunic with it he thought, _Bugger it_ , and let that come off too. This was his room. Best that she know what she’d locked herself in here with.

He didn’t hear her running for the door. He turned and she was still there, watching him, and he could not help but see himself through her eyes and hate himself. All of his body’s strength had been earned through pain, paid for in shredded skin and spurting blood, the history of it written in scars as plainly as words on a page. For her, looking at him must be akin to looking at death.

“Get out,” he growled. “I’m warning you, Little Bird.”

“Is that really what you want?” Where had this new voice of hers come from? It was so different from her courtly chirping he could scarce believe it was still Sansa Stark here in front of him.

He sat down on the bed to pull his boots off. “I told you what I want,” he snapped. “I told you what I’ll _have_ , if you stayed.” He looked up at her. “Have I lied to you before?”

She shook her head.

“Go on, then,” he pleaded. He meant _Leave_ when he said it. He was sure of it. 

Instead she stared right at him and slipped her modest gray gown off her shoulders. In the dim light of the single lamp he could see the way her silk shift clung to every line and curve of her. Her hair cascaded past her shoulders, red as blood in the firelight. Her lovely face was still in many ways the face of a child, but her eyes…there was nothing childish about the way she was looking at him.

 _This isn’t how this happens_ , he thought as she stepped closer to him. _This isn’t how anything happens._ He was trying to think of a way to say as much when she leaned forward and kissed him, her hair falling like a veil over the both of them.

Rage boiled in him, at her childishness, at every sentimental fool who had let her believe that she could put her faith in a kiss. Surely she had no idea what such things could lead to.

Gods, her lips were so soft.

He gripped her hips, digging his fingers in, waiting for her to whimper as her flesh bruised. When she didn’t, he pulled her into his lap. He expected see fear cross her face like a storm cloud, but instead a blush crept into her cheeks.

He laughed, breathlessly, unable to believe what he was seeing. Then he pulled her close and kissed her the way he wanted to.

 _Any moment now_ , he thought as he nudged her lips apart with his tongue. She was going to wrench herself away from him soon enough and flee from here. He’d savor her while he could.

His hands ran up her arms to tangle in her hair. He’d thought of those red tresses often, unpinned, spread out beneath her. The fine strands caught between his fingers, tethering her, ensnaring him, every second making him less certain of his ability to pull away.

“You can still run,” he rasped into her ear. “You may yet escape.”

She shivered. Not a shudder of revulsion, but something more physical; he felt gooseflesh prickling over her arms. “I don’t want to.”

He kissed her again, roughly, all teeth. Her hands gripped his shoulders and he thought _now, she’ll push me away_ and still she didn’t. He pushed her hair back, exposing the long line of her neck, the skin there so delicate he could see the veins just beneath. 

There was no way she couldn’t feel the ridges of his scars, against skin that soft. No way that his beard wasn’t scratching her, no way that feeling her pulse between his teeth wouldn’t cause her to panic. She gasped sharply and squirmed against him, but she didn’t say _Stop, please no, you’re hurting me._

He had to be, gods damn her, why didn’t she _say_ it?

He tugged at the laces of her shift, and smirked when he felt her hands on his. _There it is,_ he thought almost with relief, only to look up at her in shock as her deft fingers undid the laces in a few graceful motions.

She let the flimsy material fall away, pooling about her waist. For a moment Sandor could only stare, utterly unmade by the sight of Sansa half-naked in his lap. 

Then her hands were on his again, guiding him back to her.

“Touch me,” she whimpered. “Please.”

He was powerless against those words. 

Even as he tried to be gentle he knew that it was useless. His scars, his teeth, the calluses on his palms; these were too much a part of him to spare her, and he was past the point of being able to deny himself. He heard her breath becoming ragged as he allowed his hands to explore more and more of her. And when he took one of her taut pink nipples in his mouth and ran one hand up the inside of her thigh, she clutched his arms and actually _moaned_ , the sound of it nearly finishing him in his breeches.

He moved his hand higher, seeking the enticing heat between her legs. Her smallclothes were in the way, and as he wrenched them aside he heard the faint sound of rending fabric and wondered again how she could seem so unafraid. Then she cried out sharply when his fingers found her cunt, and the slickness there and the sounds she was making became the only things that mattered.

He didn’t know how to touch a woman there, not really. No whore had seen fit to tell him, and so he could only listen to Sansa’s little gasps, feel her fingers digging into his shoulders and do whatever he could to make that happen again. When she squirmed he wrapped his free arm around her waist and pulled her against him, her naked back against his chest, her arms pinned to her sides, and from there it was even easier to work his fingers between her legs while her cries became more and more frantic…

“Wait,” she sobbed, “wait, I can’t, it’s too much-“

And now here she was, finally, asking him to stop, and it was as he feared. He couldn’t.

“I’ll have that song,” he hissed, relishing the way she writhed against him. “You promised.”

He looked down as she keened and struggled in his arms. Her movements had pulled her shift up to her hips, leaving her practically naked. He could see her dark curls nearly hidden beneath his hand and felt his cock twitch in response. Pressed flush against him like this, there was no way she couldn’t feel him iron-hard against her backside. Were it not for her shift, twisted and useless around her waist now, he’d have every inch of her to feast his eyes on. He moved his hands to the fabric, prepared to tear the bloody thing off, and saw the faint red stripe across her thighs where she’d been burned.

He traced the line of it with his finger, a touch more intimate somehow than anything else he’d done. “Is this why you’re here, little bird?” He cocked his hips, letting his manhood press more firmly against her. “You still want to be ruined for your beloved king?”

She nodded, and he finally understood. He started to laugh.

“You decided my cock would serve you better than a hot iron, then? You flatter me, my lady.” He squeezed her breasts, his thumbs teasing her nipples gently. “Go on. Tell me.”

She twisted in his grip, trying to look at him. “Are you angry with me?”

He ground lecherously into her in response, showing her his desire had not diminished in the slightest. “I’ll be angry if you lie,” he said. “Now _tell me what you want_ ”.

“I want this…” Nothing in her highborn breeding had taught her how to ask to be fucked, and he grinned as she stammered over the words. “You. To…take me…”

“As my lady wishes,” he snarled, and slung her onto her back. He loomed over her on the bed, finally seizing her shift and whisking it off her. Now she was naked and perfect beneath him, exactly as he’d pictured it again and again, and how could the fact that she was using him matter to him now? He’d been used all his life, and had never been so sweetly rewarded for it.

He roughly shoved her legs apart and knelt between them, started to unlace his breeches and saw the look of apprehension cross her face. He remembered with a twinge of guilt the last time she had been in this position. At the time she had thought he had saved her, and now here she was again.

 _We might have never left that alley,_ he thought. _I didn’t save her. I never could._

But she reached up to touch his face, her fingers carding through his hair, and her touch was so gentle and deliberate that it felt like forgiveness.

He worried she might scream when he pushed into her. He’d never had a maid, but he knew there was blood, the first time, and pain as well, although how much of either he wasn’t sure. She did clench her teeth and her fingers tightened around a handful of his hair, but she did not scream, did not beg him to stop. 

He shut his eyes and rocked forward, cautiously, until he was fully sheathed inside her. It couldn’t have been easy for her; she was so tight it was almost hurting _him_ , yet when he opened his eyes she wasn’t crying or grimacing in pain. Her blue eyes were blown wide, nearly black in the lamplight, her lips slightly parted, her breath coming in soft little _ohs_ as his thrusts grew stronger. 

She was looking down, he realized, at the place where their hips were joined, watching him move inside her, her eyes hazy like someone waking from a dream.

“Too late to run now, girl.” He meant it as a taunt, but the strain in his voice took the edge out of the words. Still, he regretted saying them when a look of real fear seemed to flicker in her eyes in response. He could not take them back, and feared anything else he said would make it worse. So instead he kissed her, more softly than he had before, and kept kissing her like that until he felt her relax under him.

He could not bear to shut his eyes, but the sight of her threatened to bring him over far too quickly. Just as he’d never had a maid, he’d never bedded a woman on her back like this. His whores preferred to ride him, or to be fucked from behind, all the better to cast their eyes elsewhere while he took what he had paid for. On top of her like this, he felt like he was drowning in her. Everything, the way their legs were tangled together, the way her perfect little breasts bounced to the rhythm of their bodies, her soft breath on his neck, all drove him to the edge faster than he thought possible. 

“Talk to me,” she moaned, as her hands roamed over his chest, his arms, as if she was desperately searching for something. “Please.”

He had no idea what to say, but in that moment he could not have refused her anything. “Sweet girl,” he heard himself groan. “My girl, my Sansa, my sweet little bird, mine, do you hear me? You’re _mine_ -“

It was her eyes that finished him, overwhelmed him so much he had to close his own. He bit her shoulder as he came, growling and shaking, so thoroughly lost in her that his name and his past might have never been.

He wanted to stay in her after he was spent, bury himself in her scent and try to prolong that blissful peace. But her chest was heaving against him, and he rolled onto his back to let her breathe. He felt the sweat cooling on his skin and tried to concentrate on that and nothing else. But tendrils of thought crept back in, the knowledge that what they’d done was madness, that they’d as good as killed themselves right there…

He moved onto his side to look at her. She was sitting up, her long legs drawn up against her chest and her hair strewn like a cloak over her back. It made her look very young and slightly feral, more _Northern_ than he’d ever seen her. It made him want her again, but he did not dare reach for her. He was weighted down by a sense that this was a version of Sansa Stark that no one had ever seen, that no one may ever see again. It was too rare a vision for him to touch, and so he simply gazed at her and waited.

After a few moments she stretched and stood. “I should leave,” she whispered, glancing at him with troubled eyes.

 _Don’t_ , he wanted to stay, but instead he rumbled, “Aye, soon someone will notice you missing from your cage.”

She began to dress, tugging her disheveled smallclothes back on, then her stained grey dress. Her wild hair she twisted into a thick cable that fell over her shoulder. As she performed these movements that rigid, courtly facade began to settle in place again, burying the wolf-girl he’d just bedded. Sandor watched this happen and despair, sharp as a knife, punched through his gut.

“And what of the tomorrow, little bird? Do we die by sunset? Does Joffrey learn in the morning that his queen and his dog have betrayed him, or do you plan to wait until your wedding night?”

She looked honestly surprised. She padded over to the bed, leaned over and kissed him on the temple. He felt something cracking and bleeding deep inside of him when she kissed him like that.

“I won’t let him hurt you,” she whispered.

He wanted to believe her so badly, he didn’t even have the strength to laugh.

She did not sneak out of his room. She simply opened the door and stepped out into the hallway, shutting it behind her with no regard for the noise. Sandor did not rise from his bed to watch her go, but in his mind’s eye he could still see her. Not scurrying into the shadows, but striding down the halls as if this whole castle was hers, like a conqueror.

Like a queen.


	7. Chapter 7

When Sandor opened his eyes, he could tell by the stillness in the room that he’d been alone for some time. After years of training, he’d developed the habit of waking at dawn whether he needed to or not, and muscle memory and the gray light out the tiny window told him that dawn it indeed was. 

A bolt of panic shot through him. He was half-dressed before it occurred to him that if they’d been found out, he’d have been woken at sword-point by his fellow Kingsguards. Whatever had gone on in the few hours he’d been asleep, no one as yet knew that Sansa Stark had given up her maidenhead to the Hound.

 _I won’t let him hurt you_.

What could she have possibly meant by that? They’d both be hurting plenty when Joffrey found out, and it was inconceivable to Sandor that he wouldn’t. Bloody hells, the whole castle would know the first time Sansa’s chambermaids helped her dress. He’d left marks on her, marks she wouldn’t be able to explain, gods he’d been so thoughtless, _stupid_ -

And as if this wasn’t bad enough, remembering what went on between them was stirring his lust again. He should be fixated only on his own survival, but instead he was seated in his bed, staring at his hands like a simpleton. He could still smell her on him. It made it near impossible to think.

_I won’t let him hurt you._

She had no such power to protect him, and yet Sandor had already been shocked by the lengths the girl was willing to go to thwart her captors…

His next thought sent a hot, sick pain through his chest and up to his temples.

Suppose her boldness had been borne of knowledge that Joffrey would never find out. No one ever would, because there would be no Sansa Stark by morning.

Suppose she had put her soiled clothing back on, kissed him goodbye, and calmly flung herself out of the highest window she could find?

It was a horrible enough thought to be true.

He dressed impatiently, forcing himself to make himself presentable only because there was a chance she still lived, and he needed to get close enough to her to persuade her from carrying out this cursed plan. His armor he took more care in putting on. If she was already dead, he intended to kill as many people in this hellhole of a city as he could before they brought him down.

When he emerged from his room a short time later, he had to fight the urge to slink rather than stride. It would not do for anyone to look at him and see a man with secrets.

As luck would have it, the first person he came across was Ser Meryn. Such a man was too stupid to ever suspect the Hound of deceit, and this morning he looked especially the worse for wear. His eyes were red-rimmed and dimmer than usual, and he sipped from a wineskin and grimaced at the sound of Sandor’s approaching footsteps.

“What news?” Sandor spoke a bit louder than was strictly necessary, noting with pleasure the way the smaller man grimaced. “Where’s his Grace this morning?”

“His Grace is sicking up every bit of food he’s eaten since he was weaned off the tit,” Ser Meryn replied, his voice a harsh croak. “The Queen isn’t much better. She’s in her quarters with all the curtains drawn, screeching at anyone who tries to get near her.”

Sandor allowed himself a small smirk. “So the Imp is still in charge then?”

Trant nodded. “He’s furious about last night. Between the state their Graces are in from that Riverrun wine and what happened to the Stark girl, he’s ready to have your brother hanged.”

A cold fist clenched around Sandor’s heart. “The Stark girl?”

Ser Meryn flashed that wormy smile of his. “You didn’t hear? Stupid little bitch wandered off again last night and ran into your brother when he was tearing apart the castle. Seems he had quite a bit of fun with her before getting out of the city.” He noted the shock on Sandor’s face, and his grin widened. “What’s wrong, Clegane, are you jealous? You should have taken a page from the Mountain’s book. Shown her what she wanted instead of staring after her like a lost pup.”

The red mist was clouding Sandor’s vision again, and the slimy bastard didn’t see it.

“Don’t worry, dog, you’ll get your chance at her now. I suspect we all will, now that she’s ruined for the King.” The knight put a hand on Sandor’s shoulder, leaned in close, his breath appalling. “Since you’re the last to know, you’ll have to be content with the scraps. That’s fitting, isn’t it?”

The first blow from Sandor’s mailed fist knocked out three of Trant’s teeth. Sandor could not recall what happened after that, save that it took two more knights to pull him off the fucking idiot.

—--

Lying was like any other womanly skill, Sansa now realized. When you first started, be it embroidery or writing, deportment or song, you were clumsy. But you practiced, and what had at first taken utter concentration became habit. 

Her first lies at King’s Landing had been easy. My father was a traitor. My mother and brother are traitors as well. I am loyal to my beloved Joffrey. They were simple lies to tell and ones that no one actually expected to believe. She was just supposed to say the words, but it had still been the foundation to build her skills.

Lying to Lord Tyrion two nights before had been harder. He was smarter than most, for one, certainly smarter than Joffrey, and Sansa had worried he’d see right through her lies the same way he saw through the King’s pettiness and Cersei’s arrogance. 

She’d pounded on the Imp’s door, weeping and pleading for help. He’d flung the door open, anger and fear warring on his face, and to Sansa’s relief she saw Shae in bed behind him, half-heartedly trying to conceal herself beneath a sheet.

She’d thrown herself sobbing at Lord Tyrion’s feet, and in the chaos that had followed (Shae pacing the room and cursing in Lorathi, Tyrion trying to make sense of Sansa’s babbling while also frantically scanning the hallway for prying servants), Sansa had forgotten to be nervous when she delivered her account of what had happened.

Then, some time later, Shae had supported her back to her rooms. It had been hard for Sansa to lie to her friend, but she was fortunate that she did not have to lie for long. As soon as they were safely cloistered in her chambers, Sansa had been able to tell Shae the truth.

Shae had listened with wide, horrified eyes, but when Sansa had finished talking she had only kissed the younger woman on the forehead and whispered, “Brave girl.” And Sansa’s heart had been so full of love for her she thought it might burst.

Then came the examination from the healers, which was authentically humiliating enough that Sansa needed no deception to convey her displeasure at it. By then Shae had helped her by using her fingers to deepen Sansa’s bruises, had cut her own palm to supply more blood to the meager amount staining Sansa’s thighs. At least it had not been Grandmaester Pycelle, but a younger maester Sansa did not know, under two septa’s watchful eyes.

So far they had all been fooled. But now Sansa would need to lie more skillfully than she ever had, and she was nervous. As she walked with Shae to the Small Council chamber, she reminded herself that this was good, that she could put her nerves to use. She’d rubbed some lemon juice into her eyes, leaving them red and running, and she wore long sleeves and a high collar, the way a shamed woman was expected to.

When the guards showed her into the Small Council chamber, she was surprised to see precious little of the Small Council themselves. Cersei was seated on the right, her face pinched with suspicion or distaste. Tyrion was on the left, somber-faced, the only one to stand in greeting when Sansa entered the room. Joffrey was seated at the center, clad in an elaborately-stitched gold doublet, his face impatient. And standing behind him…

 _Oh no,_ Sansa thought, and bit down fiercely on the thought before it could show on her face. _Oh gods, please don’t make him listen to this._

The Hound’s face was ashen, his eyes bloodshot, but he wore the same stony expression he always maintained for his duties as Joffrey’s sworn shield. 

She didn’t dare look at him, and she sensed him pointedly not looking at her. Soon that, she feared, would become suspicious, so she sneaked a glance at him before moving to each of the other faces in turn. 

“Your Grace,” she said in a trembling voice. “My queen. My lords.” She gathered up her skirts in a curtsy and then kept her eyes on the flagstones. She was terrified. Good. She was supposed to be.

The Hound crossed over to the door, clearly meaning to shut it with him on the other side. But Joffrey stopped him with a sickening note of mirth in his voice.

“You’ll stay, dog!”

His voice sounded like that of a man half-drowned when he replied. “Your Grace, the Hand was very clear that-“

“You don’t take orders from the Hand, you take orders from me!” Joffrey snapped. He turned his gleaming eyes to Sansa. “You’ve told me that a dog can smell a lie. That should be useful, don’t you think?”

Sansa heard the door shut, heard the Hound say “As it pleases Your Grace,” just as Tyrion said, “Lady Sansa is not on trial here.”

“No, she is not,” Cersei spoke up for the first time. “She’s merely going to tell us what happened, so that we are all privy to the same knowledge as my brother.” Her eyes narrowed and she offered Sansa her most simpering smile. “Isn’t that right, little dove?”

“Yes, my queen,” Sansa answered, stealing a look up at them through hooded eyes. The Hound had stalked back to his position behind Joffrey.

“Tell us then, Sansa. What happened?”

Sansa took a deep breath. “Soon after Her Grace left the feast, I became overwhelmed by the wine and spilled some food on my dress. I went back to my chambers to change clothes. There were no handmaidens about, and it took me longer than I hoped. I was worried I’d offend His Grace if I came back looking unpresentable, so I tried to take the time to look my best.”

“Yes, yes,” Joffrey interrupted with a roll of his eyes. “We don’t want to hear about your stupid wardrobe. Get to the important part.”

“I tried to make my way back to the feast, but I forgot which hall it was in, and I got lost.” Sansa ignored Joffrey’s snort of contempt and pressed on. “I tried to retrace my steps, and I ended up on the lower levels, near the dragon skulls…and…and Ser Gregor was there…”

She glanced up at them again, heartened by what she saw. The Lannisters’ faces were grim, Joffrey’s repugnantly curious. They looked like they believed her. All but Sandor Clegane, who’s eyes looked like they were screaming, and none of them were looking at him.

“I…I asked him to show me the way back to the feast, and he said the feast was over. I asked him if he knew the way back to my chambers, and he said it didn’t matter. He said where we were would serve just fine.”

On the word _fine_ her voice broke, just as she had practiced in seclusion. She heard Lord Tyrion shift in his seat.

“Lady Sansa, if you’d like a few moments to-“

“She’ll talk until I say she can stop,” Joffrey sneered. “Go on.”

“He…he told me to take my clothes off. I didn’t want to, but I was afraid he’d kill me if I didn’t do what he said…he was so angry…when I wasn’t fast enough he tore them off me.” Sansa felt hot tears gathering at the corners of her eyes, born by strain or memory or just the Mother’s mercy she didn’t know. “I begged him to stop, and he told me he’d tear me in half if I didn’t keep quiet. I didn’t know what else to do, he was too strong to fight…”

“Of course, little dove,” Cersei cooed. “No one thinks you should have fought him. But you might have convinced him to let you keep your virtue for the King.”

“I tried…when he told me to…to open my legs…I told him no-“ she twisted her hands together. She mustn’t look at the Hound, mustn’t be tempted to ease the pain in his eyes. “He had a knife. He…” she buried her face in her hands. “He held it to a torch until it turned red, and when I told him no again he burned me…it hurt so much…”

Her shoulders heaved up and down with sobs. They weren’t difficult to produce. Her heart was breaking anyway.

“And then he forced himself on you?” Tyrion asked, his voice strained with disgust.

Sansa nodded, and then collapsed to her knees. “Mother help me, I’m so sorry, Your Grace, please, forgive me, _please_!”

“You say he burned you?” Joffrey’s voice was dangerously bored. “Show us.”

Sansa reached hesitantly for her skirts, and was relieved when Tyrion held up a hand. “That won’t be necessary, my lady.” He turned to Joffrey. “Did you hear nothing of what she said? Have you no limits to your depravity?”

“You can’t talk to me like that!”

“Enough,” Cersei snapped. “Sansa, you’ve been very good for telling us all this. I know this can’t be easy for you.”

“Thank you, my queen,” Sansa whimpered.

“I have one question, little dove. You may not wish to say it, but you must. Did he spill his seed inside you?”

Sansa paused, unsure of how to answer, hoping they would mistake her indecisiveness for embarrassment. If Joffrey had asked the question, she would have figured it for more perverse desire for details. But if Cersei was asking it, it might be important.

There was no time to deliberate. She made a decision, and prayed it was the right one. “I believe so, Your Grace. If I understand such things correctly.”

“So she may be carrying a Clegane bastard, then?” Joffrey scoffed. He turned around in his chair. “You hear that, dog? You may be an uncle!”

Sansa saw Tyrion eye the door nervously, but the Hound only clenched his fists and muttered, “As you say, Your Grace.”

“Very well.” Joffrey turned back to Sansa. “You can go. My mother, my uncle and I will decide what’s to be done with you.”

“Thank you, Your Grace.” Sansa rose to her feet, wiping at her eyes with her sleeve. She looked at Joffrey, made sure her eyes were locked on his as she spoke the only truth she’d utter in that room. “I’m so sorry.”

“Away with you,” Joffrey answered.

Sansa gathered up her skirts and forced herself to walk with measured steps out of the Small Council chamber. As soon as the door was shut behind her she collapsed, shaking with relief, into Shae’s waiting arms.


	8. Chapter 8

_First Cersei. Then the boy. Then the dwarf_.

“So what do you think, dog? Was she telling the truth?”

That, Sandor decided, would be the smartest way to go about it. Joffrey had more combat training than any of them, but Cersei was taller and smarter, and would fight the hardest to get away. He could cut her throat before the other two knew what was happening. Joffrey would be too stunned to react right away; his faith in the Hound was as unshakeable as a child’s for a parent. Sandor could run him through and watch his confused eyes go dead, and catch the Imp before he toddled to the door and smash his fucking head in…

“Dog!”

Sandor looked up, startled to be addressed. 

“Your Grace?”

“The king asked you a question,” Cersei said coolly, twisting about to regard Sandor with suspicious eyes. 

Sandor pretended to clear his throat to buy himself some time, and Joffrey scoffed impatiently.

“Well? You listened to her story. Was she lying?”

He turned that last word over in his mind. Calling what Sansa had done in here _lying_ , as if it were the same as the thing that whores and cowards did, was a bit like comparing the Sept of Baelor to a Gin Alley hovel. He’d listened to every buggering word of her story, knowing it wasn’t true, and still when she’d wrung her hands and whispered “ _It hurt so much_ ” Sandor had needed to suppress the need to go to her, shield her, offer whatever comfort he could. 

She’d been called in here to tell a story, and instead she’d sung a song. And like any good song, it fixed itself in the listener’s mind the way mere words never could.

He could tell them what had actually happened, and die alongside the Little Bird. He could kill them all right now, and take her from this city, by her own free will or bound and gagged if he had to. Or he could join his voice with hers.

Sandor thought he might have loved music, once, when he was very small. He couldn’t quite remember.

“Sounds like she spoke the truth to me,” he said slowly. “You saw the way she carried on. Someone clearly frightened her badly. And the way she described my brother…it sounded like him.”

Aye, it had, enough to make Sandor’s skin crawl. He could clearly hear Gregor’s voice saying those things, could all too easily summon up the image of him leering over Sansa with a knife, could see her face twisting in pain as that massive body pinned her down and cracked her open. Sandor had not thought it possible to hate his brother more.

 _But it didn’t happen like that,_ he reminded himself.

And another, darker voice answered, _No, it didn’t. Gregor didn’t threaten her, didn’t rip her clothes off, didn’t wake up with her blood all over him. That was you, dog._

Joffrey waved a dismissive hand, clearly disappointed with Sandor’s answer. “You can go.”

Sandor nodded to the King and to Cersei and made for the door.

“A pity,” he heard Cersei say behind him. “Such an obedient little thing. She would have a made a good wife for you, in time.”

“Then perhaps we should find someone who will be a good wife for me _now_ ,” Joffrey said acidly. “And as for the traitor’s daughter…”

Sandor was desperate to hear more, but to hang back would violate his orders and draw suspicion. He closed the door behind him with a shudder.

 _You’re not safe yet, Little Bird,_ he thought. _I hope lying feels good for you. You’ll never be able to stop now._

He couldn’t decide if he worried more that she hadn’t planned for that, or that she had.

——

Since the incident with Ser Meryn, Sandor had heard no one else speak of Lady Sansa’s unfortunate ordeal.

People knew, clearly, but they didn’t speak of it, at least not where the King’s sworn shield could hear it. It would have been easy to credit this curious silence to Tyrion or Cersei, who for once had found themselves agreeing on the same course of action. Tyrion didn’t want word reaching Robb Stark that his sister had lost her honor in this way, Cersei didn’t want one of her father’s most feared bannermen removed from the battlefield to be tried for his actions, and neither of them wanted Lord Tywin to find out they had allowed such a disaster to occur. 

Still, Sandor suspected it was Joffrey’s influence that kept even the most scatterbrained of serving wenches from mentioning the attack. To allow harm to come to a valuable hostage was one thing. To have the Mountain essentially steal the King’s bride, use her for his own pleasure and render her unfit to produce the realm’s heirs, would call Joffrey’s manhood into question as well as his ability to rule. He’d had to put the girl aside, to avoid speculation that the first prince or princess was a dog disguised as a lion. It must have rankled Joff to lose his favorite plaything like that, and he would be quick to take his frustration out on the first available target.

Now, to court a new future queen, Joffrey needed to appear as appealing to prospective brides as possible, an image that would be difficult to maintain if he continued to torture Sansa in full view of the court. He no longer demanded her presence in the throne room, which was just as well. Word was the girl was barely able to leave her room, and Sandor saw none of her over the days that passed.

He was frantic to see her, and did not dare seek her out. He needed to warn her that she was still in terrible danger. Joffrey may have put her aside, but she would not be spared his cruelty for long. And Lord Tywin _would_ find out soon enough, no matter how much his children schemed to keep the truth from him. The thought of Gregor touching her made Sandor’s blood boil; the thought of Tywin Lannister finding out what she had done pushed him past anger into something close to panic, a sick feeling that no amount of violence could alleviate.

War was bearing down on all of them and all Sandor could think about was Sansa Stark; how to protect her from the Lannisters, from herself. And how to do it without ever speaking to her, because in addition to the suspicion it would raise, Sandor still wanted her so badly it hurt.

_You’re mine._

Seven bloody hells, she’d made a liar of him as well.

The knowledge of it enraged him, wound him tightly enough to send him down into the middens of King’s Landing. The brothel he ended up in had no name, no silk hangings on the doors, just two barrels of sour wine and a handful of sunken-eyed girls sulking in the corners. He let the one who looked the hungriest lead him to a room in the back, gave her a silver to use her mouth on him and told her there would be another in it for her if she didn’t say a word. The girl shrugged, tucked the coin into her dress and sank to her knees, and Sandor closed his eyes and told himself that _this_ was what the world really was. He’d sleep dreamlessly tonight, drunk and spent, and the girl would be able to eat because of the coin he’d given her. There was no treachery to worry about, no savage machinery working in the dark, waiting to snag, mangle, pulverize those who got too close.

The whore took him in with her lips, and then her throat, and this was the only true beauty in the world. Sansa Stark, staring up at him, touching his face, sighing _please_ , all this was a lie, enticing in the moment but in the end as repulsive as the stained floor beneath his feet or the rats he could hear scrabbling in the walls.

The girl knew enough to finish him off quickly, and that was true kindness. And when he pressed another silver into her hand and left without a word, that was true gallantry.

All the rest was stinking, rotting, burning lies.

So why was it so hard to stop thinking about it?


	9. Chapter 9

Alone in her chambers, in the dark, Sansa could pore over her truths like a miser over his gold.

She didn’t like to leave her rooms anymore. She disliked the way that women whispered behind their hands as she passed, grew nervous when men’s gazes lingered on her too long. Sometimes they spat. Sometimes they said foul things. A few had followed her, forcing her to stay in more populated areas of the castle. 

More than those who looked at her, though, she worried about those who didn’t. She knew there were spies all over the Red Keep, and it soon grew exhausting to try and see herself through their eyes. Would a ruined woman walk like this, grip her skirts with her hands just so? Should she look more frightened? Less? Was she smiling too much, or was she expected to put on a courtly face to hide her shame? It became too much effort to think about, and so she retreated to her rooms, where she could be alone with the truth.

As the nights passed, her bruises had quickly faded. So, too, had the pain from her broken maidenhead, which even in the moment had not been as bad as she’d been led to expect. She’d imagined an agony akin to being run through, hearing other girls talk about it, and what she’d felt instead had been something deep and soft and personal. _Her_ pain, cradled in her womb, a pain she did not have to pretend she didn’t feel and so brought with it no fear, no humiliation. It had made her feel strong. 

As for the parts that hadn’t been painful at all, she didn’t dare to think of them when anyone else was around, lest they notice her blushing and growing short of breath. Alone, she could let herself remember. Alone, she could let herself want.

Sitting in a shaft of sunlight at her window, her embroidery forgotten in her lap, Sansa thought about strong arms and harsh words and the silken scrape of skin on skin. And she wanted.

She was startled by a knock on the door, and as she hurried to her feet and went to answer it she could not fully suppress a rush of hope. There was no reason for the Hound to seek her out; she knew he must be furious with her. But still she imagined it was him outside her door, and when she opened it he’d pull her into his arms and growl _I’m not finished with you yet, little bird_ , and then...

Sansa opened the door to find herself face to face with Queen Cersei, and she felt her blood run cold.

“Good afternoon, Your Grace,” she managed to stammer, sinking into a curtsy. 

“Are you alright, my dear?” Cersei replied, cocking her head. “You’re flushed.”

Trying to force the sinful things she’d just been thinking from her mind, Sansa gestured halfheartedly at her sewing discarded near the window. “I was sitting in the sun. I must not have realized how hot it was…”

Cersei brushed past her, a servant trailing close behind her, holding a tray. As Cersei seated herself at the little table the maid made herself busy, pouring a cup of what appeared to be tea from one vessel, a goblet of wine for the queen from another.

“Please sit, little dove.”

Sansa obeyed, and Cersei pursed her lips and said nothing until the servant had bustled out the door.

“Your Grace, had I known you were visiting I would have-“

“Oh, do stop it,” Cersei interrupted. “I don’t have time to listen to your little peeping, and I suspect you’re rather sick of it as well.”

_She knows_ , Sansa thought wildly. _Oh gods help me, she’s come to tell me how I am to die._

“Joffrey and I have discussed at length what’s to be done with you after the war is over.” Cersei fixed Sansa with poisonous green eyes and allowed herself the tiniest smile. “He suggested marrying you to Ser Gregor.”

Sansa’s reaction required no trickery; her panic voiced itself with no aid from her mind. “Your Grace, _mercy_ , please, I can’t-“

“That’s enough,” Cersei hissed. “We know you can’t. My brother said as much before I could get a word in. He objected on the grounds that forcing you to marry Ser Gregor would be unimaginably cruel. Joffrey felt a traitor’s daughter deserved no better, of course.”

“No, Your Grace,” Sansa muttered, her voice tight with fear.

“I managed to quiet them both long enough to remind them that Gregor Clegane has had three wives so far, and none of the poor things managed to survive a year. That you survived one encounter with him is…unusual enough. We might as well kill you now if we gave you to him.”

Sansa shuddered, imagining what horrors those brides must have seen. 

Cersei ignored her. “Joffrey then proposed we marry you to the Hound instead.” Then she laughed at the look of utter shock on Sansa’s face.

“Another ridiculous idea,” the queen continued. “Even if Sandor Clegane weren’t Kingsguard, he’s a second son of a minor house. No titles, no lands, and yet Joffrey thinks his loyalty is enough to give him claim over the entire North.” Cersei leaned forward, pitching her voice low. “And if you’re pregnant with a Clegane bastard already…”

The queen’s eyes burned into her, and Sansa grew more aware that she was in terrible danger.

“Your Grace, I don’t know if I’m-“

“No, but we’ll know soon enough. And if you _are_ pregnant and remain unwed, soon enough your traitor brother will find out you’re carrying a bastard around the Red Keep like a common whore. He still holds my brother prisoner. I won’t see Jaime punished for your mistake.”

_She’s a monster,_ Sansa thought coldly. _She thinks I was raped, and she looks me in the face and says such things to me._

_Or she knows you’re lying, and she’s trying to trick you into giving yourself away._

Sansa couldn’t place the inner voice that supplied that second thought. It sounded a bit like her mother, a bit like Robb, and a bit like herself. It sounded older, and very sure of itself.

“I- I’m sorry, Your Grace,” Sansa said aloud, casting her eyes down. “I’ll do whatever you think is best. You and the king, I mean.”

“You’d marry the Hound if we ordered it?” Cersei smirked. “If you were smart you’d be begging me for mercy again. I’ve known Sandor Clegane since we were both children. He’s no gentler than his brother, I assure you.”

_Sweet girl,_ Sansa’s memory growled in response, and _All right, little bird, you’re all right_. 

“He saved me,” she whispered.

“He did,” Cersei agreed, and took a long draught of her wine. “And don’t you feel safe now, _little bird_?”

The queen’s eyes flashed fire over the rim of her cup, and Sansa knew she was lost.

“What would you have me do, Your Grace?” Sansa tried to sound small and helpless, but fear and anger thickened her voice and made it sound like a challenge. “Please tell me what to do.”

Cersei took the as-yet-untouched cup of tea and set it in front of Sansa. It was dark brown and oddly thick, and smelled herbal and strange.

“The smallfolk call it moon tea,” Cersei explained. “Have you heard of it?”

Sansa had, from Shae, but it wouldn’t do for the queen to know that. She shook her head, hesitantly.

“It keeps a man’s seed from taking root. It’s mostly whores who use it, but it’s been a boon to noblewomen as well.” She leaned back in her chair, leaving the cup in Sansa’s reach. “If you drink it, by morning we can tell Joffrey for certain that you’re not with child. Once the war is won we can arrange a more suitable marriage for you. Lancel, perhaps. He’s dull as dirt, but he’d treat you gently.”

_And I would be a Lannister,_ Sansa understood. _My children would be Lannisters. I’d never be free of them._

“Or you can refuse it,” Cersei continued. “And we can proceed as if you are with child, and do what Joffrey thinks is best.”

The queen didn’t try to make it sound like anything other than a threat. Refuse Cersei’s offer, consent to marrying the Hound, and Cersei’s suspicions would be confirmed and it would doom them both. 

Or drink the tea, sever that tie with him, and Cersei’s suspicions would be confirmed another way. But only one of them would be doomed if she did that.

And she would live longer as a Lannister than as a Clegane.

Sansa picked up the earthenware cup and stared into its muddy depths, as if hoping there was an answer in there that didn’t leave her trapped.

She drained the cup in two quick swallows, grimacing as the taste of dead leaves seeped into her tongue.

Cersei watched, and smiled, and Sansa smiled back and imagined her head up on a spike above the walls of Winterfell.

“It tastes awful,” Cersei remarked. “I know.” 

She drained the last of her wine, and then stood.

“You’ll feel some pain, tonight and into the morning. But it’s a small price to pay, isn’t it?”

“It is, Your Grace.” Sansa rose when the queen did, curtsied as she made her way to the door. “Thank you.”

Cersei just laughed as she exited in a sweep of perfumed silks and golden hair.

——

That night Sansa lay curled into a ball, sweat beading her forehead as the pain in her womb came in slow, brutal surges.

There would be no sleep for her tonight, so Sansa gritted her teeth and stared off into the dark and waited for another dawn in the worst place in the world.

_There’s never a chance to savor victory,_ she thought as another round of cramps subsided. _There’s only the next fight, and the next. Until I’m dead._

How badly she wished she could see the Hound. She felt they might be very close to truly understanding each other.

_He protected me, and in return I doomed him. He’ll never be safe as long as I’m alive._

Her muscles clenched as the pain returned, and she squeezed her eyes shut and saw shades of red and gold bursting in the darkness.

_Or as long as they are._

Stannis’ ships were bearing down on King’s Landing as the city slept. And out there, somewhere between here and Winterfell, her family still prepared to take revenge.

_I’m not safe, but neither are Joffrey and Cersei,_ Sansa promised herself. _Not as long as one Stark remains alive_.

The thought did not help her sleep, but it was a comfort nonetheless.


	10. Chapter 10

In Sandor’s dream he was carrying a dead woman through the streets of a city he did not recognize.

It was not King’s Landing, of that he could be certain. The streets were broader, cleaner, and the buildings seemed to be carved from black stone. He sensed other people walking by but could not see them; he was focused on the bundle in his arms.

Wrapped in a bloody shroud, she was, but Sandor still knew who he carried. Never mind that he couldn’t see her face; he knew the weight of her, the way the curves and angles of her fit against his chest. Even having only been with her once, he wasn’t able to forget that.

He’d prepared himself before for the sight of seeing Sansa die. He’d forced himself to imagine it, to taste the rage and bitterness that would consume him utterly when it finally happened. 

He hadn’t expected his rage to fail him, leaving him with nothing but grief, exhaustion, and the knowledge that he was alone. He’d always been alone.

He couldn’t fight, feeling like this. He couldn’t do anything at all.

As if sensing his weakness, the people he passed in the streets seemed to notice him more, to drift closer. He heard whispered curses, heard the scrape of steel being tested. It was that tension he’d sensed in the air just before the Fleabottom riots, that sense of liquid violence, ready to flow into the first channels it could find and completely fill the space it occupied.

His burden shifted in his arms, clawing at her shroud. With the logic one is granted in dreams, he knew even as he set her on her feet that she was still dead. It didn’t matter that she stood beside him; her parchment-white face and the broken way she moved were enough.

It was no longer Sansa, though. The girl who stood before him now was no more than four years old, a skinny little thing with wild black hair. In his waking life Sandor had forgotten what she looked like, but she’d been preserved in his dreams, unchanged since he’d last seen her.

His little sister Elinor tugged at his hand, and whispered, “We have to hide.”

She took off running, dragging him behind her. He was small now, too, he realized, only a hand or so taller than her, and as she led him through these black, foreign streets he remembered how awful it had felt to be so small. The people loomed over them both, their eyes hard and hateful, but it wasn’t them he was afraid of…

A guttural roar split the air behind them, and Elinor sobbed in terror. It wasn’t the sound a beast but of a boy _pretending_ to be a beast, and with a sick rush Sandor remembered this was one of Gregor’s games, games that never amused anyone but himself. He’d pretend to be a lion, or a wolf or a bear, and Sandor and Elinor would have to run.

Sandor knew how to fight back, when caught. He’d lose, without fail, but often enough he’d be able to blacken Gregor’s eyes or bloody his nose, and their father would praise him for it. Elinor had been taught by their mother, was going to grow up to be a lady, and ladies didn’t fight. Elinor mostly cried when she was caught, but occasionally she bit or kicked in her panic, and was always chastised for it. If Gregor hurt her, their mother cautioned, she must try harder not to make him angry.

Elinor had been a good girl, eager to please. The last time she and Gregor played, she hadn’t made a sound until her spine snapped.

As they ran the strange city was changing, the buildings becoming smaller, shabbier. The stones turned to mud beneath them and now Sandor knew where they were. He hadn’t set foot in Clegane’s Keep since before his seventeenth nameday, but one didn’t forget the place one hated the most.

He knew where they were going before they reached it. A disused compartment at the very end of the building had once been used for storage but had flooded in the spring. The mold had gotten in and no cleaning would get rid of it, so the servants had simply boarded it up and ignored it. There was a gap between the boards, large enough for two children to squeeze through but too small for Gregor. Safe, as long as Gregor wasn’t able to snake an arm in and drag one of them back out. Or as long as he didn’t realize that surely he was strong enough by now to tear the barrier away.

The two children squirmed into their hiding place. Sandor could smell rot and mud and could feel Elinor trembling against him. 

There was that terrible roar again, and his sister shoved her face into his arm and whispered, “No, no, no…”

She was clearly still dead. The smell of rot was coming from her hair, and Sandor could hear her bones creak as she clutched at him.

She was begging him to protect her, and he was going to have to tell her he’d already failed.

There came a sound of splintering wood, and Sandor snapped awake.

——

Sandor woke up with tears on his face, but that was not nearly so troubling as the thought racing through his head, and that thought was, _I can’t do this._

He couldn’t remember what he’d dreamed about; all he recalled was a sense of panic, and it followed him out of his sleep and clawed at his throat while he tried to breathe.

_I can’t do this._

The sound of weeping echoed in his head. He thought of Sansa falling to her knees before the Lannisters. He thought of his early days as Cersei’s sworn shield, hearing the newly-wedded queen cry herself to sleep on nights King Robert was away. He thought of his brother’s first wedding and the sound of screaming that had echoed around Clegane’s Keep the first several nights after.

_I can’t do this._

This was how the world was. He’d grown to accept it early, because there was no other choice. Those with power imposed their will on those without, and the only choice the powerless had was to bend or to break.

He’d tried to tell Sansa that, had wanted so desperately for her to understand and cease her struggles before she became more trouble than she was worth. He didn’t want to see her broken, and he’d reasoned bending would be easy for her. She was a lady, after all, gentle, with a head full of songs and foolishness. It should have been the easiest thing in the world for her, to do as she was told and keep herself alive.

They’d break her any day now, and he couldn’t watch it happen.

 _You will,_ he told himself. _You’ve always done._

He remembered the feel of her lips grazing his temple, her hair falling in his face.

_I won’t let him hurt you._

Had anyone, ever, said such a thing to him?

Would such foolish words be the ones that broke him for good?

Sandor put his head in his hands and tried to soothe himself with thoughts of violence, but that sense of peace wouldn’t come. 

Out in the darkness, the bells began to toll.


	11. Chapter 11

As Sansa hurried to her rooms and barred the door behind her, she was struck with the cold realization that history was not in the past.

Since before she had learned to read that was how she had understood it. History was things that had already happened, and the fact that the characters in those stories were real once hardly mattered. They were dead, and you couldn’t touch them, couldn’t hear their voices. You didn’t see them die.

Now, as dread twisted in her stomach, Sansa understood that history was always happening, and the men and women caught in its path had all been frightened, or elated, or enraged. Those feelings died with them, leaving only the events behind. Tonight history was happening in King’s Landing. A great battle was being fought and stories would be told about it, but no one who heard those stories would understand how it felt to be here, right now, when the city fell.

If someone was truly determined to break the door down, they could do it.

_Do you have any idea what happens when a city is sacked?_

Sansa backed away from the door and cursed herself for not making Shae come with her. She was sure the next time she laid eyes on her friend it would be upon her body, her dress ripped open and her throat cut. _No one is raping me,_ Shae had growled, but didn’t she understand that history didn’t care what happened to girls?

The dark was making these thoughts worse, and Sansa drew back the curtain to let it some light from the torches outside.

She looked out the window and into hell.

Green and orange flames, billowing into the sky, churning in the waters of the Blackwater Bay. Sansa saw ships burning, her eyes wide, her heart pounding in her ears. She tried to tell herself she was high up above the carnage, and behind glass. There was no way she could be hearing the screams of men burning, no way she could smell them as they cooked within their armor…

_I can never go back_ , she thought frantically. _I can never be a little girl again, never be someone who hasn’t seen this, I can never go home._

“The lady is starting to panic.”

Even before she whirled around to face him Sansa knew the source of that rasp, yet so tightly wound were her nerves she couldn’t stifle a yelp of fear. The sound hung in the air and earned her a chiding _Shhhhh_ from the darkness near the bed.

“You bring anyone to that door with your noise, Little Bird, and I’ll kill them,” the hulking shadow whispered. “I don’t care if it’s Cersei or Stannis or your pet whore. They find me here, they’re dead. Believe that.”

There was something wrong with the way he was speaking. 

“What are you doing here?” Sansa whispered. 

“I knew you’d come,” he answered, and even in the dark Sansa sensed the way he moved was off as well. He was sitting up on her bed now. Had he been sleeping there? “This is where the little bird goes, isn’t it? To hide. To _plot_. Here or the godswood, and it isn’t safe there now.” He gestured toward the window, and Sansa noticed something in his hand. “Your old gods can’t protect you from _that_.”

“Are you…” Sansa stopped herself from asking _Are you alright?_. He wasn’t. “Who’s winning the battle?”

“I don’t know,” he slurred, and Sansa realized now that the object in his hand was a wineskin, and understood that the reason he was acting differently was because he was blind drunk. “I only know who’s lost. Me.”

A flare of eerie green light from outside lit up the room, finally giving Sansa a clear view of the Hound. It was a nightmare sitting there on her bed; blood streaking his armor and his white cloak, his eyes gleaming from behind his tangled black hair. She saw the blood and once again understood the cold reality of war; those stains had come from men who were alive this morning and were now dead, men who’s last moments had been ones of shock and pain. Caused by this creature in her room, this beast who watched her with mad eyes and clenched fists.

There was more to Sandor Clegane than killing; Sansa knew it, and so did he, she believed. But she’d been foolish to forget that killing was very much a part of him. She’d been foolish to forget it’s what he did best.

“Did you come here to kill me?”

As if she had anywhere to run, if he said yes.

Instead he smirked, and took another long draught of wine. “I should, at that,” he coughed. “You ruined me. Can’t sleep, can’t concentrate worth a shit. Half my men might still be alive, if I’d been able to think of anything but you, Little Bird. So perhaps I should kill you.” He staggered to his feet, and Sansa took a cautious step back. 

“But I won’t.”

His eyes moved briefly from Sansa’s face to the flames outside, and Sansa was not reassured in the slightest.

“Put on something warmer,” he ordered. “And gather whatever you feel you might need, so long as you can carry it yourself. We’re leaving.”

Sansa was so startled by this that she could only repeat, “Leaving?” in a tremulous voice, earning her a snort of contempt.

“The little bird repeats whatever she hears. Yes, leaving, girl. You and I. Away from the fires. North, maybe. Anywhere.”

His voice broke at the last word, and Sansa thought _Fear._ She watched the firelight play across his scars. _It’s not the wine nor bloodlust that makes him seem so different now; he’s more terrified than he’s ever been. Dear gods, how awful must it be out there?_

“You…” she began, and hesitated. “We can’t. Cersei’s sealed Maegor’s Holdfast. There isn’t a way out.”

“Not for me,” he laughed. “I have the white cloak. And I have this.” His hand flew to his sword, the hilt as bloodied as the rest of him. “Any man who tries to stop us is a dead man.”

Sansa couldn’t answer, and the Hound’s eyes sharpened slightly with curiosity.

“Don’t you want to go home, Little Bird? I’d keep you safe. If anyone tried to hurt you I’d kill them.” 

She saw them, then, flying from King’s Landing into the dark of the woods. She saw him killing for her, starving for her, the both of them cold and hungry and miserable. She saw them hunted, pursued by men with torches and dogs, saw him overrun and torn to shreds, saw herself being dragged back to this hellish place, made all the more horrible for her having almost gotten away. Saw Stannis executing him for his service to the Lannisters. Saw Joffrey burning him alive for his acts of treason.

She saw them making their way North, saw Robb and all the Northern lords condemning them for standing by while Eddard Stark was beheaded. And the look of shame on her mother’s face, as she explained what she had done to avoid being married to Joffrey.

“I’m not going with you,” Sansa blurted out, and then cringed away. She expected rage, curses, blows even, for he’d been angry with her before and he’d be furious with her now and his blood was up, and Sansa knew what men did then…

He was looking at her with the lost eyes of a dog chained out in the cold, and that was worse.

“Don’t be stupid,” he said faintly, and that word got Sansa angry enough to face him fully. “Stannis-“

“Stannis won’t hurt me,” she snapped back. “And Joffrey needs me alive. You’re a dead man if you stay here, and you’ll travel faster without me. You’re better off-“

“ _Liar_ ”, he spat. He advanced on her, backing her up until she collided with the table and nearly fell. “Fucking lying little _witch_.”

_He’s saying these things because he’s in pain_ , Sansa thought. _It’s what he does._ But it still stung to hear them.

“Think what you want of me,” she said coldly. “Just go. You’re not safe here.”

“I could take you with me anyway.” He was leaning into her now, forcing her to bend back, the ridges of his armor biting her through her clothes. “You think your brother would be less indebted to me if I brought you back as my prisoner? He wouldn’t be. I could throw you at his feet with my seed dripping down your thighs and still he’d have to thank me. Still he’d have to _pay_ me.”

She looked away at that, embarrassed, but he reached up and gripped her chin, making her look back at him.

“Made yourself forget already, did you? Perhaps the little bird needs to believe her own lies, to make them sound so real.”

“I didn’t forget,” Sansa whispered.

He ran his thumb slowly over her cheekbone. “And yet you don’t trust me to bring you home.”

_Let him believe that,_ the inner voice Sansa had come so much to rely on said soothingly. _If it gets him to leave here before they find him and kill him, it’s for the best._

“I’m sorry,” she said out loud.

“I’m sorry too, Little Bird,” he murmured. Then he was grabbing at her, pushing her up onto the table, shoving her flat on her back. She looked up at him and saw rage and lust and deep, unfathomable sadness.

She reached for him blindly, as if touching him could make him understand what she was unable to say in words, but her fingers scrabbled uselessly over his armor. He caught her wrists, pinning them up over her head with one hand, the other tearing at the front of her gown with vicious strength. The stays of her bodice snapped in his grip, the silk shredding with barely a whisper. 

She drew her breath in sharply at the sudden feel of cold air on her naked skin, and she saw, just for a second, his eyes flicker up to meet hers. 

He’d done that the first time, she remembered. It was, in a way, the thing that had surprised Sansa the most. She’d been prepared for some of it; how clumsy she would feel, the way her heartbeat pounded in her ears, a certain amount of pain. She hadn’t been prepared for it to feel good. And he was always _looking_ at her, catching her eyes, questioning; Sansa had begun to suspect he wasn’t even aware he was doing it.

_I can’t fight him,_ she thought. _But he’ll stop if I ask him to. I may have to cry and beg to get him to hear me, but he will._

She watched the hand that wasn’t holding her wrists drift across her stomach to her breast. The knuckles were bloody, splitting open, and there were smudges of ash on her skin where he touched her.

_You stupid little girl_ , the voices of King’s Landing chorused in her mind.

“No,” she whispered. She meant it as a reply to her own thoughts, but he thought it meant for him.

“I won’t be long,” he muttered above her. “And you won’t need to a make up a lie this time. Let those pretty blue eyes spill over and tell Stannis what the Hound did to you. They say he’s heartless, but you may yet move him. He may even apologize before he locks you back in your cage.”

Sansa shook her head. “You won’t hurt me.”

“You’re wrong, Little Bird.”

“You won’t.” She tried to twist her wrists free even as he bore down on her harder. “Sandor- please…”

The sound of his name gave him pause, and he stared at her, wild-eyed, in control but only just.

“Please,” she said again. “I just want-“

“I don’t fucking care what you want.” He resumed tearing at her dress, revealing more and more of her skin until her clothes were hanging off her in two halves. Embarrassed to be so exposed, she squirmed and shut her eyes, only to snap them open when his fist bashed into the table next to her head.

_”Look at me_.”

Sansa looked at him. Their eyes met and Sansa thought again about begging him to stop. He wouldn’t take her against her will, not if she truly resisted, he wasn’t that sort of man.

She needed to believe that.

“This is who you brought to your bed,” he hissed. He leaned over her, their faces close, one of his thighs shoving against the fork of her legs, making her gasp. “This. And if I took care with you then, it was because I didn’t want you to wake the whole bloody Keep with your screaming. Now, I don’t care.”

“Sandor-“

“Shut up, damn you.”

“Will you please just let me touch you?” Sansa pleaded.

He glared down at her, breathing hard. He did not let her go.

“I won’t fight you,” she whispered. “You know I can’t. But does it have to be like this?” She felt a sob welling up in her throat and swallowed it back down. She feared if she started crying now she wouldn’t be able to stop. “Does it have to hurt?”

He let out a low growl and Sansa held her breath.

His shoulders slumped, his head dropping until their foreheads pressed together. 

“Little bird…” His voice was choked, and Sansa could feel the weight of tears on her eyelashes. 

She tried to move her arms, and this time he allowed it. He was already righting himself, pushing away from her, and Sansa followed, She reached for him and he flinched, but she persisted, twining her arms around his neck, pressing her damp cheek against his scarred one.

“It’s all right,” she whispered. She felt him shaking his head.

“Yes.” She reached one hand up to stroke his hair, her voice growing more insistent now that she could breathe freely again. His hands were on her back and she could feel them trembling. “It’s all right,” she said again, and although they both knew it wasn’t she could feel his breathing slowing, steadying, as she kept saying it.

She tilted her face up to his, kissed him, tasted wine and blood. 

His hands tightened around her waist. “Careful,” he groaned, and Sansa responded by kissing him again. This time he kissed her back.

_This might be the last time for both of us_ , Sansa thought as his hands made their way back inside her ruined dress. _The last time to be touched like this, the last time I can ever make him feel good, and oh Mother, please, keep him safe when he’s out there all alone…_

She moved her hands over his chest and whined in frustration when she felt his armor, a soft sound that turned into a yelp when he bit her throat in response. He’d pushed the remains of her dress off of her shoulders, was kissing every inch of her skin he could reach with feverish urgency. When she cried out he looked into her eyes. His were still crazed, but the despair she’d seen there was gone, swamped by desire, and Sansa felt a tiny spark of joy in her heart that she could do that for him.

“Please,” he panted, “Sansa, I can’t- I need to-“

“I know,” she answered, her voice almost as breathless as his own. “It’s all right, I want it, I want-“

Even before she spoke his hands were already working at his laces, freeing himself, then pushing her knees apart. Sansa remembered the pain from the first time and bit her lip in apprehension, then nearly drew blood stifling a cry when he thrust into her. There was a little pain, and the shock of being opened so suddenly, but more powerful than that was the sense that she was _alive_. There was death outside, death all over him, staining her skin and streaked into her hair, but they were alive and together and in this moment she could forget everything else. She could forget who she was. 

“Yes,” she moaned as he moved in her, “yes, yes…”

If he answered her in words she couldn’t hear it; his face was pressed against her neck. She could feel his breath sobbing in and out, though, and she could hear the wood from the table creak and splinter dangerously as his movements grew more forceful.

She clung to him and closed her eyes and thought once more of fleeing from the city; not on horseback this time but on foot, sleek and sure-footed and silent as a grey shadow, the dark woods a-glow with brilliant moonlight, the scent of prey on the air and a warm den waiting for her at the end of her hunt…

She felt him shudder, felt his movements slow, and the visions faded. She opened her eyes, saw the flicker of orange light playing on the walls, and she remembered who they were again. She was no wolf. She was Sansa Stark; hostage, ruined woman, liar. And Sandor Clegane was no longer the king’s loyal Hound, but a man who had committed treason, and Sansa could not keep him safe in her arms for any longer.

“Come with me,” he breathed into her ear, in a voice so small she could scarcely believe it had come from him.

“No,” she answered, and pushed him away as gently as she could.

He swayed on his feet a moment as he looked at her, then began to pull his clothing back into place, moving slowly as if in a daze. Still drunk, she remembered, and wondered if he was truly capable of protecting himself in this state. But of course it did not matter. To stay with her now would be suicide.

Sansa slid off the table and onto her feet, and let the tatters of her dress fall from her. She was trembling; from the cold air on her skin, from the way her blood still sang, from the remnants of the fear she’d felt. She watched him prepare to leave her and tried to think of something to say to lessen the pain of it all, and could think of nothing. He’d only scoff at courtesies like _Goodbye_ or _Gods protect you_ , and she did not dare speak anything more honest. She’d cry if she told him how much he meant to her, and she couldn’t abide the thought of being in tears the last time they saw each other.

As she looked down and tried to still her shaking hands, she heard the sound of tearing cloth.

She looked up, and he had his white cloak in his hands, the fabric so marred by battle it was hardly recognizable as the garment of the Kingsguard.

He drew it over her shoulders, the heavy fabric enveloping her, embracing her, the way in another life that of her husband would have done on her wedding day.

And then he was moving away from her, and then she was alone.

For a time she stood, and waited to see if he was going to come back, or if anyone else was going to come to the door, to free her or to kill her. But no one did.

She pulled the cloak more fully around her, cold now that her heartbeat was settling again, and walked over to the fireplace. The embers were black but hot, and kneeling before them she gently stirred and blew on them and was able to coax a tiny bit of flame, brilliant in the velvet dark.

Sansa gathered the cloak up in her arms, and pressed it to her face. The smell of smoke and blood filled her world, and she breathed it in until she was certain she would never forget it, certain the smell of her first lover was as indelible a part of her memory as her mother’s voice and her father’s smile.

Then she kissed its folds and threw it on the fire.

She stood naked before the flames as they devoured every scrap of it. As it burned she finally allowed herself to cry, silently.

When there was nothing but ash in the fireplace and her tears had stopped, she turned away. She had to dress, and to prepare to congratulate the winner of the battle.


	12. Chapter 12

Whoever stood between Sandor Clegane and the stables was a dead man, of that there could be no doubt. But no one would know how many men that particular feat had claimed. Sandor himself certainly did not. He might have killed. He might have bled. He saw nothing but Sansa Stark, proud and naked in the hellish light, looking him in the face and telling him _No_.

_She made her fucking choice_ , he thought, and that was true, true enough that it should have put all other thoughts to rest.

_The next time you hear someone speak her name, it will be because something horrible has happened to her._

That thought was true as well, and it dogged him through the bloodied streets of King’s Landing.

He goaded Stranger toward the relative safety of the woods. Over the years he’d thought of this moment often. Alive, soaked in the blood of lesser men, no Lannister boot on his neck, free to make his own way in the world. It had been a promise to himself, a treasured future hidden and guarded and saved for when it was truly needed. And yet-

_What have you done?_

He’d done nothing but show her the world as it truly was.

_What have you done?_

She’d seen him, truly seen him, and still she’d pulled him close to her, and it didn’t matter that he’d never understand why.

_You fucking animal, WHAT DID YOU DO?_

_Think what you want of me,_ he answered himself. _Just go. You’re not safe here._

He knew these woods well, had hunted in them countless times, and instinct guided him toward a clearing he remembered, where there was water and enough flat ground to stretch out and sleep. He stayed on his feet long enough to secure Stranger’s lead, and then he collapsed, boots, armor, sword and all, into the mossy earth.

——

He was awoken by the sound of Stranger braying in fear. That in itself was cause for alarm; the huge black stallion was known for his ferocity, had borne him into battle for years. Sandor sprang to his feet in one fluid motion, and saw in the grey light of the morning what had frightened his horse so.

Standing in the clearing, not ten feet away, was the largest direwolf he had ever seen. A female, from the look of it, but clearly the leader of the pack of smaller wolves that flanked her. And well she should be; she was a miracle. Direwolves didn’t range this far south. He knew that as well as he knew the north was cold. As she advanced on him Sandor saw that the pack had him surrounded, and that there were too many for him to fight off alone.

 _They’ve come for you,_ he thought wildly. _They’re of the North. They know what you did to the North’s daughter._

He drew his sword and faced the direwolf. Maybe if he was able to kill her the other wolves would scatter. At the very least he wouldn’t make this an easy kill for them. 

“Come on then, you bitch,” he snarled. “You know what dogs do to wolves.”

The wolf padded closer, but she did not lunge, did not show her teeth or growl. With every step she appeared larger, and with every step his certainty that he was about to die here grew. 

It was going to hurt, he knew. Any second now he would feel teeth tearing into his neck, see his blood steaming in the chill morning air. And yet-

It wasn’t Gregor. It wasn’t the fire. He was going to be killed by something beautiful. 

Perhaps he should be grateful.

The direwolf padded toward him and Sandor waited for his last fight to begin.

Instead she stretched her neck forward and sniffed at him. _The blood_ , he thought, but she must have been able to smell that on him from miles away. He could feel her hot breath on his face, inches from his ( _when had he ended up on his knees?_ ). She sniffed deeply at his neck, his chest, his open hands ( _when had he dropped his sword??_ ) It was as if she was searching for something, but what could a huge direwolf be searching for, if the blood on him hadn’t already excited her hunger?

She threw back her great shaggy head and howled, and the sound chilled him to the bone. He heard the little wolves join in, heard Stranger screaming in panic, and perhaps he screamed too.

_Sister_

The word slammed into his mind unbidden, unconnected to any of his own thoughts, and he clapped his hands over his ears and shut his eyes. _I’ve gone mad, I’ve gone fucking mad, these wolves are probably already eating me and I haven’t realized it yet because I’ve lost my fucking mind._

He waited to feel himself being torn apart, and it didn’t come, and he waited for the mad voice in his head to start again, to give him thoughts that weren’t his, but that didn’t come either.

When he lifted his head, the pack was gone. 

The woods, as impassive toward history as always, were waking up, and in one clearing a man who had once been called the Hound was weeping on his knees, but they did not care. Nor did they care when that man staggered to his feet, mounted his horse and rode away, and then all evidence that he, or the wolves, had ever been there was lost forever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, everyone.


End file.
